


House of Cards

by BlinkFl0yd



Category: Homestuck
Genre: Alternate Universe - No Sburb/Sgrub Sessions, Character Death, Cults, Emotional/Psychological Abuse, Ensemble Cast, F/F, F/M, Hijinks & Shenanigans, Humanized AU, Kidnapping, M/M, Mob Violence, Original Character(s), Past Lives, Poor Decision-Making Skills, The Author Regrets Everything, Torture, Violence
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2016-03-01
Updated: 2016-08-31
Packaged: 2018-05-24 03:15:45
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 6
Words: 30,822
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/6139468
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/BlinkFl0yd/pseuds/BlinkFl0yd
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>A miscellaneous group of reluctant heroes, antiheroes, and borderline villains all must work to survive a world of mob violence, mysterious organizations, horrorterror and demon-worshipping cults, long-lost secrets, hidden powers, alternate timelines, the end of the world, and all other sorts of weird crap-not necessarily in that order.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Episode 1: Newsflash (Part 1)

Episode 1: Newsflash

Wednesday, 7:45 A.M.

All she did was walk in. Honestly, that was all she did. If she had done anything truly offensive she probably would have known it.

"What in the fucking fuck are you doing here?!"

If she had been anybody else, she would have been annoyed by the griping, whiny, borderline childish tone. But she prided herself in being able to take extraordinary amounts of bullshit, and would continue to do so as long as her name was Kanaya Maryam. 

"Sorry," Karkat mumbled less than half a second after he had previously spoken, but he still didn't look at her. "Sorry, I wasn't-"

"It's fine Karkat." Kanaya sat down the copied house key she had used to get in on the coffee table as she sat down next to him on the couch. "I wanted to see how you were doing."

"I'm fine," Karkat muttered. His black hair was messier and more tangled than usual. His borrowed hoodie and sweatpants were several sizes too big, making him look smaller, more vulnerable than usual. 

"Would you like to talk?" She asked.

"Nope."

Kanaya couldn't help but sigh a little. He had been acting like this since it had happened, running hot and cold, passive one minute and fired up the other. He had been a ball of nerves since going into hiding. In retrospect, Kanaya understood why-he had to rely on his friends to keep his secret, his friends to keep him sheltered and safe from the people out for his blood. And, incidently, he is relying on them after one Vriska Serket out of their group of twelve went rogue. She had killed another one of their group of twelve-the quiet, unassuming Aradia Megido who never bothered anyone and was one of the few of their group that was on good terms with pretty much everyone else.

She had also blinded her best friend since third grade and crippled another, not to mention ran off with a madwoman. God knows what she was doing now.

Kanaya normally just resolved herself to pretend her heart didn't hurt every time she thought of her. But from Karkat's perspective, it was probably just as terrible. If Vriska could willingly go that far for no apparent reason, who else would? And could? Their circle only had ten now, who else was going to go rogue? Granted, Vriska had never actually gone after Karkat, but so many of their friends had been hurt by what she had done. So even though Karkat and Vriska were never on the best of terms, her actions had rattled him just as much as everyone else, even though he had never admitted it. It was just as well. It wasn’t as though just the effects of trauma were enough for one person to go through.

"If you want I can tell my sister I feel sick," Kanaya offered. "Then sneak back here?"

"No," Karkat said immediately. "It's fine."

"If it's fine, why do I get the feeling it's not? You are not exactly giving off the air of 'fine.'" 

"It's fine. Look, I'm sorry I'm being such a crotch-wad about this-"

"You're not."

"I am." Karkat fidgeted with the sleeves of his sweater. "It's just-"

"You're nervous. It's fine. I understand." Kanaya took her cue to open her arms and offer a hug.

Karkat reluctantly fell into her embrace. "I'm being such a fucking toddler about this. God. I don't even blame you, you've been stuck with my stupid ass for weeks, I totally get that you want a break."

"It's not a break that I want," Kanaya replied.

"Then going back to being fucking normal."

Normal. What a strange word that was. 

"God, that would be nice," Karkat mused aloud. "I'd give anything to make those fuckers, you know, not be hell-bent on killing me so I can actually go outside without worrying about being sniped or blown up or something."

"That would be convenient," Kanaya remarked.

Karkat snorted. He leaned back off of her shoulder and slouched over his knees, staring at the muted TV screen blankly.

"Text me," Kanaya ordered, breaking the ensuing silence. "Every hour or so, text me to let me know that you're all right."

"Okay."

"If I don't get a text from you, I'll assume something's wrong."

"Right."

"If you feel the need, you can call me whenever."

"I'll be fine Kanaya," Karkat muttered. "You should probably head out soon."

Kanaya frowned inwardly as she realized that school was starting in literally fifteen minutes. "If you need anything-"

"I'll. Be. Fine," Karkat repeated, sounding a little annoyed. "Look, don't…freak out over me, okay? Enjoy being normal. Seriously. I mean it."

Kanaya still felt the tension that had been there since all of this had started wrapped tightly around her stomach, but, ever so slightly, it relieved just a little. He did mean it. For the time being, things were all right. She could go to school in peace, for the time being, and despite the guilt that she felt over going when her friend was stuck inside she felt a little relieved.

"Text me," Kanaya told him as she stood back up. "I'll have pesterchum open all day."

"Okay." Karkat scowled at the television. "Bring me back Chinese?"

"Of course." Kanaya felt herself smile slightly. "Text me."

"For the gazillionth fucking time, okay."

Kanaya was a little reluctant to leave him, but she managed to pick up her keys and walk out. 

Everything was all right, she had to remind herself.

For the time being anyway.

Wednesday, 8:05 A.M.

His name was John Egbert. It was only his first day of school when he realized he was totally fucked.

"What do you mean you don't have your summer assignment?! It was posted on the school's website!" Ms. Paint, John's English teacher, stared at him incredulously. "When you signed up for this class, you should have gotten continuous reminders about this through your school email. And you had plenty of time to do it over the summer. How could you not have it with you?"

John was admittedly nervous. Even though everyone knew that Ms. Paint was definitely one of the nicest teachers in the school. Truth be told, he had spent almost the entire summer with his friends on a road trip for his belated birthday (his birthday wasn't in the summer, but things had gotten crazy life-wise during his actual birthday, so he couldn't have a real party. The road trip was to make up for it). The few days he had actually spent at his house he had spent the entire time watching his favorite movies and chatting with his friends on the Internet. It never once occurred to him that he might have homework, especially over the summer. 

Although it probably should have. 

"It's-um-not done yet."

Her name was Rose Lalonde. She was also a junior in high school. She was currently face-palming in the back of the class. She had been with John on the road trip, and, unlike him, she had completed the assignment during their free time. How John had forgotten about it, she had no idea, but even Jade had remembered. And that was saying something.

Mrs. Paint eyed him skeptically. "Of course it isn't. Bring it tomorrow. I won't accept it any later."

"Um-I might need more time…"

"Tomorrow, Mr. Egbert. I hate to start this school year off on the wrong foot, but I don't want to fail you either. That assignment is a good portion of your grade this semester."

Forty-five minutes later, Rose patiently listened to John's panicking-fest as they headed to their next class.

"I am so fucked," John moaned.

"You didn't do a single page of your summer assignment, did you?" Rose asked patiently, already knowing the answer.

"No! Quick, what do I have to do?"

"Read an excerpt from Shakespeare's Macbeth."

John brightened a little. "Really? That's not so bad."

"And then write a four-page essay on what you suspect will occur next, judging by examples of Macbeth's character the excerpt provides, and why you think that will happen. You also must complete a research diagram on Shakespeare's time period, printable via the school's website, and then staple it to your essay."

John deflated. "Oh."

"You're fucked," Rose said simply, stopping in front of the door to their history classroom and opening the door. "After you."

"Can you help me?"

Rose was about to say yes when another thought occurred to her.

"Well, you did have plenty of time to do this assignment over the summer," Rose sighed, as if this was difficult for her to say. It was slightly overdramatic, but she had a feeling John wouldn't really notice until it was too late. "If Jade could have done it while we were travelling abroad, then so could have you. And I know for a fact she did it, and you know how forgetful she is. This class is obviously going to be difficult, and if you don't start applying yourself then you will be even more fucked than you are now."

John groaned. “Seriously Rose?” 

“Honestly John, Shakespeare is not that hard,” Rose said innocently.

John glared at her. “Okay first-you’re right. It’s way harder. I tried reading 'Romeo and Juliet' once because Dave thought it would be good for irony or something like that, and I had no idea what the hell they were talking about. Second-you totally want me to do something, and you’re using unfair blackmail to get me to do it.”

“Why on earth would you say that?”

“Rose, my bullshit radar is going nuts right now. The bullshit radar never lies. Never.”

“Well….” Rose drawled. “I suppose you could help me with that task I needed assistance with.”

John stared at her. "The fanfiction thing? Because I’m sure not going to-"

"No," Rose sighed. "Let me refresh your memory....."

Wednesday, 9:03 AM

Her name was Jade Harley, a junior at Skaia High School. She has a wide variety of interests, and she was extremely excited to have a class with her friends at last! The last five years, including her middle school years, she practically had no classes with any of them. Except for Rose in the newspaper class when Jade had decided to try her hand in writing in her sophomore year. But finally, she had two classes with Rose (not newspaper, because she quit after a year, the teacher had been really mean), one class with Dave, two classes with John, and one class with all four of them. This was something she was very excited about. 

When John and Rose entered, she immediately stood up and waved at them frantically. It was a very subtle signal, telling them to sit next to her in the far back of the room. They came over, but they were in the middle of a heated conversation.

"No way!" John protested.

"Do you want my help or not?" Rose said patiently. Jade noted that John was looked as though he was on the verge of flipping out, while Rose looked calm, smug even. "I need photographic evidence."

"Why can't you do it?!" John moaned.

"I'll be taking notes," Rose replied smoothly. "Besides, it would be dangerous to go alone."

"What's going on?" Jade asked.

Rose quickly glanced around the room, as if checking to see if anyone was listening, but since it was early on into the passing period, the only people in the room was the school stoner, Gamzee Something-Or-Another (Jade couldn't remember his last name) and a slightly scary looking girl sitting directly behind them, listening to music on her headphones and looking bored. A few students were starting to trickle in, but they still had a good solid five minutes of passing period.

"All right," Rose began. "I found a great story for the school newspaper, or at least, a theory that could turn into a great story. You know the Betty Crocker factory?"

Jade stared at her blankly.

"The Betty Crocker factory a couple miles away from town? One of the school sponsors?" Rose asked. 

Jade shrugged.

“The one that practically everyone knows of?”

Jade shook her head.

"Never mind then. The point is, there were some photos that were leaked online of-" Rose stopped as a large gaggle of students suddenly entered the room, giggling madly about something. Rose waited a second, and continued in a low voice. "There were several photos of what are supposedly Midnight Crew gatherings around the factory."

"Cool!" Jade chirped.

"No! Not cool!" John said quickly.

"John-" Rose began.

"Jade, she wants to sneak into the Betty Crocker Factory! And just so you know, it’s on the edge of the town? You know that really sketchy area that practically no one goes into?”

Jade blinked. She had to think about that for a while.

"Okay, let’s make a list again. First, I am not setting foot in a Betty Crocker factory. That is a recipe for disaster.” John stopped and smirked. “Heh. Recipe? Get it?” 

“Nice,” Jade said, admittedly impressed.

“You said there was a list?” Rose asked.

“Oh yeah. Second, this whole idea is crazy! What if they're actually there? What if we get caught? We'll either get shot or arrested for trespassing, which is definitely. Not. Cool. At all."

"I would think you'd be glad to unmask a Betty Crocker conspiracy, John," Rose said patiently. "Besides, there's no proof they were actually there. But if they "

"I think it'd be cool! Like a secret mission!" Jade said.

Three reasons she said that-and there she went making her own list-one, she doubted the Midnight Crew would actually be there if a bunch of photos were leaked online, if they even were there in the first place. Two, Rose was pretty smart. If the factory was well-guarded, then she'd probably call the whole thing off and they could all go home safe and sound. And three, there was something sort of cool about the whole thing. Like they were spies on a secret mission or something! Plus, there was no way Jade was letting John and Rose go alone. Friends just simply didn't do that.

"Look, what are the odds of the Midnight Crew being here? Why wouldn't they have already left? This is a boring-ass town that's nicely suburban and not at all mobster-like, where nothing exciting ever happens," John snapped. 

"Well, I am not going back to being that one school reporter who's only stories are monthly updates on the school cafeteria lunches because the belligerent adviser thinks I'm too 'boring!'" Rose snapped. "I'm tired of being overlooked. I need your help John. I'm not helping you with your assignment unless you help me with this story!"

John groaned.

"I'll go with you two too!" Jade said eagerly. "It could be exciting. Like a real adventure...."

The bell suddenly rang. Immediately, the three kids settled into their seats as their teacher walked in. 

“Rose, just think it through,” John hissed pleadingly. “Please?”

“Welcome to history!” The teacher boomed. “First things first-turning in your summer assignments!”

John’s eyes bugged. Rose smirked. Jade winced, and gave John a pitying look.

“If you don’t have them, then I’ll accept them tomorrow for half-credit. But no later! Got that?”

Rose nudged John in the ribs, giving him a knowing glance. John gave her a defeated, puppy-dog face, letting Rose know she had won. Jade watched the exchange silently.

“Tomorrow night,” Rose whispered to John as she unzipped her backpack to take out her folder. “I’ll pick you up at twelve o’ clock sharp.”

John just looked as though he was screaming inside. Jade just patted his shoulder in reassurance.

Wednesday, 10:33 A.M.

His name was Diamonds Droog. He was a member of the Midnight Crew (unofficial second-in-command, thank you very much). He and the rest of the crew were currently residing in a shitty little motel room on the outskirts of the cute little suburban town that wasn't very fitting for him and his fellow mobsters. Yes, things had been rough lately, and Droog had essentially forgotten why they were there in the first place. But for the time being his main concern was in the moment, as he’d known someone was in trouble as soon as the boss had barked from the other room to get their asses in there.

He and his cohorts, Hearts Boxcars and Clubs Deuce, all were lined up as their kingpin, the infamous Spades Slick, glared at them while holding a (stolen) smartphone in his bony hand. It was accessed to the internet, and was displaying blurry photos of them at the Betty Crocker factory, taken by some sneaky bastard who couldn't mind their own business. Deuce and Boxcars were looking to the ground, Deuce like a child being scolded, Boxcars looking impatient. Like the latter, Diamonds wasn't intimidated. Slick got pissed easily, and while it was better to keep away Droog knew it wasn't really anything he couldn't handle. 

"Which one of you fucking morons-" Slick growled. "-Did the surveillance the night we paid a call to our friends at Crocker's? Which one of you goddamn assholes did a wonderful job of checking to make sure we weren't being followed that night so that we wouldn't be shot by the fuzz?!"

Droog nonchalantly inclined his head to Boxcars (because one of these assholes would point to him), who pointed to Deuce, who pointed to Droog (yep, called it). Slick looked like he was ready to facepalm, but didn't.

"Well this is just fan-fucking-tastic," Slick said coolly, although Droog could sense the fire behind the tone. "You're all a bunch a assholes, y'know that right? Okay, let's think back. A couple jobs before the Crocker thing, we had to meet up with a client for some shit that I can't remember. Who was on surveillance then?"

"Me," Deuce piped up.

"Okay. Then logically, during the job after that, Boxcars should have been the one watching out for people following us when we went to try and gun down the Felt, then Droog for the time we tried again after that, and then there was the Crocker job, so it should have been...." Slick stopped in mid-sentence, realizing who the culprit was.

"You boss," Boxcars piped up in his loud, booming voice. "Yer the one who was supposed t'watch out fer anyone followin' us."

An awkward silence followed after that realization. Deuce made the mistake of snickering, but went silent after Slick shot him an angry glare. Droog, personally, was not surprised. At all.

"Never mind that then," Slick snapped. "Tomorrow night, we're paying another visit to the Crocker place. No one better fuck up. Deuce, you're on watch. Don't fuck up. Got it? Don't. Fuck. Up."

"Why tomorrow?" Droog asked, not really caring whatsoever because that meant he had the day off tonight.

"Because I have shit to take care of tonight," Slick snapped. 

"I dunno Slick," Boxcars said carefully. "Should we really risk goin' back there again?"

"Well, we don't have a choice, do we?" Slick growled.

"We don't?" Deuce piped up meekly.

"No. We don't." Slick glared at them icily. "Take a look at the plans that I made. I left them....somewhere. Probably. Look at them and get this through your heads-don't fuck up. Got that?"

They all nodded somewhat hesitantly.

"Good." Slick gave them one more nasty glare, before stomping back to the single apartment bedroom to do whatever he did in there. The rest of the gang wasn't allowed to go in and just slept in the other room. Why they took so much of Slick’s bullshit was a mystery that Droog had yet to solve.

"Ugh." Boxcars took the liberty of flopping back on the moth-eaten sofa. It creaked and groaned under his weight. "Am I the only one who's wondering why going back to that factory is so damn important?"

"Slick knows what he's doing!" Deuce piped up optimistically.

"Uh-huh." Droog didn't really want to think about his moody boss at the moment. He also really didn't want to go back to that damn factory. It simply was not a smart thing to do, especially because it was probably going to be surrounded by the police. Plus the Felt probably would have taken a hint to stay away from the place if they were smart, for the same reasons that the Crew should. 

But when Slick had his mind set on something, there was no stopping him. And of course, Deuce would always want to tag along, which would cause Boxcars to come, and then Droog would have to go too because he was literally the only one in this goddamned establishment with a shred of common sense.

So tonight, they were all going to end up at Crocker's, whether they liked it or not.

Droog thought about sitting in the armchair, but before he had a chance to, it was quickly taken over by Deuce. Sighing, he decided to just go in the tiny kitchen and read his hidden copy of Gray Ladies. Damn, how he loved his Gray Ladies.


	2. Episode 1: Newsflash (Part 2)

**Wednesday, 12:45 PM**

His name was Dave Strider.

He was trying to decide between the variety of health hazards in the school cafeteria, and he had narrowed it down to two choices. There were the cheeseburgers, which probably broke over twenty health codes, and then there was the Sloppy Joe's, which were more Sloppy than Joe but only broke approximately ten health codes.

Sloppy Joe it was then.

"Rose and John are lucky," He complained to Jade, as they walked out of the cafeteria. "They bring lunch. They have no idea what kind of suffering the rest of us have to go through. We've been selected as tributes for the mystery meat Hunger Games and it sucks balls."

"Speaking of Rose, did she tell you about what we're going to do tomorrow night?" Jade said brightly.

"No. I haven't had any classes with her yet." Dave nearly tripped over who he had dubbed a long time ago as 'the stoner guy.' He was kneeling next to his locker on the bottom row, digging around for weed or crack or Skittles or whatever the hell that guy smoked.

"Watch it motherfucker," The guy hissed, eyes bloodshot and practically glowing a bright red.

"Sorry dude," Dave replied nonchalantly as he and Jade continued on their merry way.

Dave took a moment to briefly reflect for no apparent reason that at their school, lunch time was basically interchangeable with free time. Their cafeteria was literally just a small room that smelled like moldy cheese, with about ten card tables crammed around the cart where the kids bought lunch. Not the best place to eat. So most of the students just spread out around campus and ate lunch wherever they could-on the floors next to lockers, in the bathrooms, behind the school, in the janitor's closet. And since the teachers and any other staff member always ate in the teacher's lounge to most likely to get away from the kids, said kids were almost always unsupervised. It was good news for people like the stoner guy, who could basically smoke whatever crap they wanted right there in the halls. People brought alcohol, too, and one time there had been an all-out food fight in the middle of the campus. It had been epic. None of the teachers knew a thing about it.

In the case of Dave, Jade, Rose, and John, their particular lunch spot was in the janitor's closet. In their freshman year they attempted to sit in the cafeteria in one of those card tables, but that had been short lived for obvious reasons. The janitor's closet, despite it smelling like mildew, was a much more preferable spot to eat at, and provided a type of secrecy that each of the kids kind of liked. They ate alone, just the four of them. Dave never admitted it, but it was kind of nice. Because of really mushy, sentimental, hella unironic shit that he would never in hell admit to, but nice.

Rose and John were already there, John enjoying his trademark fruit gushers and Rose sipping soup from her thermos.

" 'Ey guyth!" John greeted them through a mouthful of Fruit Gushers when they walked in.

"Hi!" Jade chirped back. She took a seat on an upside-down bucket, balancing her lunch tray in her lap.

"'Sup," Dave decided to forgo sitting on a bucket in favor of plopping down cross-legged on the floor.

"Hello." Rose smiled pleasantly, which immediately sent off warning bells in Dave’s head. "How have your classes been so far?"

"Eh. They're all right. So, Jade mentioned something you all were going to do tomorrow night?"

"That's right," Rose said as John groaned, supposedly at the mention of whatever the fuck they were doing tomorrow night.

"Don't remind me," John moaned after he swallowed the last of the fruit gushers. "Dave, after Rose tells you what she has planned, please tell her she's crazy. Please?"

"John, if you would please let me speak," Rose said before Dave could say anything. "You've seen those pictures of what could be the Midnight Crew at the Betty Crocker factory, correct? And you have heard how the police think that they might be right here, in this town, but no one has technically proven it yet?"

"Yeah. Who hasn't? Not like anything else happens," Dave replied, carefully taking the first bite of his Sloppy Joe. Which of course, was a risky move. Ooh, he could feel the food poisoning setting in. He was the biggest fucking daredevil ever.

"In short, I plan to go over there tonight to try and take some pictures. If I can actually prove that they're over there-"

Dave nearly choked on his Sloppy Something. Okay, he had to stop with the totally epic risk-taking for just moment to make a rational decision.

“Let me just clarify some shit here,” Dave said slowly. “You’re talking about the Betty Crocker factory. The one on the edge of town. The one that’s been abandoned for like ten years.”

“Five,” Rose said patiently.

“And you want to put on a stakeout to catch the fucking mob in action doing whatever mobster-y shit they’re doing down there, if they are actually down there and we don’t get eaten by rats instead.”

“Not the way I would have put it, but yes.”

"Oh hell no. Are you insane?" Dave asked, sounding much calmer than his actual thought process.

"Thank you!" John exclaimed.

"You don't have to go, but I need a backup photographer just in case," Rose continued, ignoring John. "That's where John comes in. And Jade's coming as well." She looked at Jade. "Are you?"

"Um-umph!" Jade nodded. "I'll be your lookout!"

"Thank you. Come to think of it, I should have just asked Jade first."

"Uh, yeah!" John snapped.

"Well, the more the merrier, as they say." Rose turned towards Dave. "As I previously mentioned, you don't have to come if you don't want to."

Fuck.

A bit of exposition-Dave had known Rose for a long time. Like, 'since kindergarten' long time. And he knew that annoying as Rose could be, she was pretty damn smart.

Except when she got these really stupid ideas in her head. And he knew better than anyone that once she got one of those ideas in her head, there was no stopping her.

Dave sighed internally. Fine. Maybe it would get him out of whatever weird rooftop shit Bro had planned for tomorrow night.

"I guess I'll go," Dave said, purposely sounding bored. "Y'know, if you need my help."

Rose smirked. "Great. I will pick you up after I pick up Jade."

“Tomorrow night right?”

“Yes. I would rather go tonight, but I promised I would assist a friend in their homework assignments.”

Dave faintly heard John grumble something under his breath.

**Thursday, 2:09 AM**

His name was Spades Slick. He had another name once, but that was a long time ago. Thirteen years if you wanted to be exact. But now, he was the leader of the infamous mobster group known as the Midnight Crew. They were famous for the amount of atrocities they had committed across the country, especially since the assholes in blue hadn't ever had a chance of catching them.

They'd been running across the country ever since they had formed the Crew, with one goal and one goal only-wipe out the Felt and take down Lord English, the Felt's leader. Sure there were other gangs that they had faced down, but none of those morons had stood a chance against them. Their main priority was to wipe the Felt off the face of the earth, and so help him he was going to do it even if his merry band of idiots weighed him down the whole way.

Which was why he was in the car at two in the morning putting up with their bullshit.

"Are we almost there?" Deuce asked.

"Almost," Slick grumbled.

A minute slowly ticked by.

"How about now?"

"No."

Another minute.

"Now?"

"No. Ask me one more time and I'll run a knife through your skull."

Deuce went quiet, thankfully. He lasted a total of two minutes.

"Slick?"

"What?"

Silence. "Never mind. I forgot what I was going to say."

Slick growled. He could feel a headache kicking in and prayed to whatever god he didn't believe in that it wouldn't turn into migraine.

Droog, seeming as though he sensed Slick's worsening mood, switched on the radio to a local jazz station that was Slick's favorite. Slick growled at him for the gesture. Droog ignored him.

"Slick?" Deuce's voice grated against his eardrums.

"What?"

"I remembered what I was going to say!" Deuce sounded proud of himself.

"Great. Tell Boxcars."

"Okay. Hey Boxcars!"

"What?" Boxcars' voice grumbled.

"Oh...um..." Deuce hesitated. "Sorry, I forgot again. You know how you get so focused on one thing that you forget the other thing? Well, that's what happened! It's weird huh?"

Slick resisted the urge to bang his head into the dashboard. But it occurred to him that that would make his headache worse, so he didn't.

Up in the distance, he recognized the flickering red and blue of police lights. Then, behind the lights, he recognized the silhouette of the Betty Crocker factory.

"Shit!" Slick hissed.

"What's wrong?" Droog scowled before noticing the sight ahead of them. He let out a sigh, and pulled over to the side of the road.

"What do we do now?" Deuce asked.

"Sneak in around through the back." Slick's mind raced. He knew there would be cops there, but he didn't think there would be that damn many of them. The town wasn’t that big.

"Pretty sure they'll have some more of them in the back Slick," Droog pointed out.

"Then we'll create a distraction. Deuce, you got the C4 blocks ready?"

"Always." Deuce smartly lifted his hat, revealing small sticks of dynamite resting on his head. How he did that Slick had no idea, but he was just relieved that Deuce didn’t keep the explosives as cards anymore. Accidental detonation was always inconvenient, and Slick was sick of having to get Deuce new decks of cards.

"Perfect. Set them up along the fence. Detonate them when I tell you to. We're going in." Slick nodded in approval. "Hell yeah, that sounded cool.”

"Not until you pointed it out," Droog muttered.

Slick gritted his teeth. "Just set the C4, alright?"

* * *

 

Meanwhile, Rose was leading her three companions up the hill leading to the fence in the back of the Betty Crocker Factory.

"You know, it's not too late to go home," Dave pointed out casually, his teeth chattering from the chilly night air. "You know, go home and have a nice cup of cocoa or something. Everybody loves cocoa. Cocoa's awesome as fuck."

"We'll be fine Dave," Jade said optimistically, displaying her grandfather's old rifle proudly.

"Okay, I'll admit that's somewhat reassuring."

There was a whine from behind them. Bec, Jade's massive devil beast of a dog, was trailing behind them up the hill.

"Bec!" Jade scolded. She pointed a finger in the direction from which they came. "I told you to wait in the car! I'll be fine!"

Bec remained stubbornly planted in his place.

"Go!"

Bec growled a little, sounding a little like he was grumbling under his breath, turned around and walked away dejectedly. John, Rose, and Dave watched him a little warily.

Jade's friends weren't ever really sure what to make of the dog. Wherever Jade went, Bec was there. He followed her to school and waited right in the front for her to come out so he could escort her home. When she went to the movies with her friends or out to eat lunch at some fast food place, Bec was always there, waiting outside. He followed her to their houses, literally everywhere she went. He was a big dog too, the biggest dog any of them had ever seen. Dave always said Bec was as creepy as fuck and needed to be shot, but never in front of Jade.

"Did you have to bring him?" Dave asked uncomfortably.

"I didn't really have a choice, he gets antsy and chews my shoes when he’s alone,” Jade said. “But he'll wait by the car, don't worry.”

"Get down!" Rose suddenly hissed.

"What?" Jade asked anxiously.

"Just get down!"

They obeyed her instructions without another word, kneeling almost right next to the metal fence that had barbed wire rimming the top and vines growing up along the side. From there they could just make out the flashing red and blue lights in the distance.

"Dammit," Rose swore. "The police are here."

"Why wouldn't they be?" Dave hissed. "Midnight Crew sightings are kind of a big fucking deal. Especially in this stupid town. Call in the news coverage everyone, Skaia’s going on the map for gangster activity. Woohoo."

"Well, looks like they aren’t here. Let's go," John said casually, and attempted to crawl away and leave, but Rose grabbed the hood of his black sweater before he could.

"Not yet!" Rose snapped.

"Roooooose," John whined.

"No."

"Rose, maybe it would be better if we just went home," Jade interjected.

Rose stared at her in dismay. "But-"

"Well, why would they come with the police everywhere-" Jade began, when suddenly, something in the near distance exploded, her words were cut short, and her eyes widened.

* * *

 

His name was Hearts Boxcars.

As Deuce's bombs went off in the front, he watched as most of the police officers guarding the back ran to see what was going on. Then he and Droog exchanged a quick nod before the two of them managed to scale over the fence, maneuvering over the barbed wire with ease. They dropped to the ground and began to run towards the factory at top speed.

The two single police officers that remained posted in the back immediately whipped around when they heard them approach, but not in time to prevent Boxcar's massive hands from catching and snapping the neck of one and Droog's cuestick to crack the skull of another. Both dropped to the ground almost effortlessly and the two continued on their way.

* * *

"Did something just blow up?!" Jade whispered.

"Well fuck," Dave muttered.

"Look!" Rose hissed, peering through the wires of the fence and the green vines. Her friends crowded behind her in time to see two men in dark suits and brimmed hats attack two police officers. Jade's gasp of horror sounded as soon as they saw the officers die. The men dumped them to the ground unceremoniously, all without making a sound, and continued on their way. All without making a sound.

"Holy shit." John's eyes were the size of saucers. "That's them, isn't it?"

"Where's my cell phone?" Rose frantically dug through her pockets. "Fuck, where did I put it?"

"Look, there's the other two!" Jade gasped.

Sure enough, two more hatted men came from the opposite direction that their other cohorts had come. The four of them stood only a couple hundred yards away from where the kids were crouching behind the hill.

"Oh God, _where the hell is my phone?_ " Rose was desperately groping through her pockets. "John, you take the picture!"

"Right!" John fumbled for his phone.

* * *

"Quick, let's get inside before the fuzz regroup," Slick muttered as they heard shouts of the incoming officers who had probably been inspecting the explosion.

"How are we going to get out?" Deuce asked worriedly.

"One thing at a time. Let's go."

* * *

"Hurry!" Jade hissed.

"Got it!" John yanked out his cell phone and switched it to the camera setting, but was too late. The Midnight Crew was already on the move, heading away from the kids towards the factory. The big one kicked the back door in, and he and his cohorts piled inside until they had disappeared.

"Let's go!" Rose hissed, now having found her cell phone. She stood up and began climbing over the fence.

"What?" John squeaked.

"Coming!" Jade slung her rifle over her shoulder with its strap and began scaling the fence right behind Rose, helping her over the barbed wire lining the top of the fence.

"Rose!" Dave protested. "Jade!"

"If you're coming, then hurry up! I'm not leaving until I get a picture!" Rose snapped, and she and Jade dropped to the ground.

"This is a terrible fucking idea," Dave snarled at her.

"Come on," John sighed to Dave, and began to climb the fence. Dave looked annoyed, but followed him. The girls began to head towards the door the Midnight Crew had kicked down.

"Hey wait up-OW!" John yelped as the barbed wire cut into his hands as he struggled to get over it.

The lights of several flashlights appeared suddenly from behind the side of the factory, and began heading in their direction.

"Eep!" John squeaked.

"Go!!!" Dave snapped, and shoved him off the top of the fence.

"ACK!!!" John immediately got tangled in the barbed wire, but his body weight managed to allow him to rip through it. He hit the ground, hard.

With the barbed wire out of the way, Dave easily jumped over the fence and hit the ground without much difficulty. John on the other hand, was groaning and struggling to get to his feet.

"Guys, c'mon!" Jade cried, as Rose immediately shushed her, then gestured at the boys to hurry up.

Dave yanked John to his feet, and took off running, practically dragging a bloodied, disgruntled John behind him.

"I knew this was a bad idea," John moaned, as Dave yanked him inside and helped the girls slam the door shut behind them, barring it with several random crates conveniently lying around.

* * *

 

Slick knew it was a bad idea coming back to the factory, but he didn't have much of a choice. His contact apparently had important information to give him, information that she wasn't able to give the first night he and his crew had broken in. But as soon as those photos had gotten out, courtesy of some wise-ass who couldn't mind their own business, the best thing to do would have been to convince the rest of the crew that they had to leave town despite the high amount of Felt activity going on there.

Still, there was no way in hell he was leaving without what his contact was going to give him. No way in hell. But that didn't change the fact that he'd severely underestimated the amount of fuzz who were on their heels. And that there had to be at least half the Felt on the premise. Oh well. They'd split up, and while the rest of his Crew was chasing after the Felt, he meet with his contact, then they'd regroup, and then they'd be outta here, hopefully never to return again. He absolutely loathed Betty Crocker. Loathed it with a passion.

"So when do we get to blow stuff up?" Deuce piped up eagerly.

"Soon. You know the plan, right?"

"Well, it took us a while to find where you put it, but yeah, we know what to do."

"Wait-" Slick stopped, and held out his hand. In the distance, he could hear the faint noise of yelling, and somebody breaking down a door with a loud thud.

Although he didn't think of wondering why they had to break down the door. They hadn't been the ones to bar it with crates, they were too cool for that shit. Although if he had, he would have dismissed it as the cops being a bunch of drama queens.

"Shit!" Slick swore. "Fuck. Let's split up now. Except Boxcars, instead of goin' with Droog and Deuce, you're gonna lead the fuzz away from 'em, alright?"

"Aw boss, I played bait last time!" Boxcars whined.

"Shuddap and fucking do it before I gut ya."

"Fine," Boxcars grumbled, pulling his gun out of his trench coat.

The yelling got louder. Slick tensed.

"Go!" He hissed, and with that, he and the rest of the crew ran off in separate directions.

* * *

 

Her name was Jane.

Otherwise known as Lady Crocker, otherwise known as the "Condescension's" right-hand lady. She was sixteen years old. And she was watching the wall of security screens, particularly the one featuring the four men dressed in black.

"They're here," The Condesce growled. She tossed her long, wild hair over her shoulder as she shot a glare at Crowbar, who was standing at her side. "You said they WOULDN'T get in again!"

"I didn't think they were stupid enough to come back," Crowbar snapped. Quarters stood next to him, tall, silent, and leering over his shoulder.

"No shit," Condy snarled. "How many assholes we got hangin’ around here?"

"Just me, Clover, Quarters, and Die," Crowbar replied. "Everyone else refused to come because of the police."

Jane noticed that he chose his words carefully. It was the Condesce who originally agreed to have the police guard the factory in the first place over those photos got out despite the problems it would cause the Felt, but the normally-sarcastic Crowbar was wise enough to watch his tongue around the Condesce. She didn't take 'sass' very well.

“Well fuck ‘em,” The Condesce growled.

"Hang on," Quarters said. His eyes, which had been previously scanning all of the screens again, had suddenly come to a stop at one. "We have another unauthorized entry."

"Are you shittin’ me?" The Condesce screeched.

Jane's eyes immediately snapped to the screen Crowbar was indicating to, the camera monitoring the back storage room. Four more figures that were definitely not the Midnight Crew were desperately trying to bar the door with some of the shipping crates.

Immediately, her gut twisted.

"Kids?" The Condesce raised an eyebrow. "Hold up. Are they the same kids-"

"No." Crowbar shook his head, squinting at the blurry camera footage. "I don't think so. Besides, there's twelve of 'em, aren't there?"

"Eleven," Jane corrected. "If you don't count, well, you know."

"Ya mean ten, if you don't count the lil’ Serket bitch," The Condesce sneered. "And no, these ain't the same kiddies. Even if they were, I'd still give the same fuckin' order to kill 'em."

"Right," Crowbar muttered.

"So fuckin’ kill ‘em."

"What about the Midnight Crew?" Jane asked.

"Hmm." The Condesce thoughtfully drummed her nails against the surface of the desk. "Crowbar, you take care of the kiddies. Jane, you, Quarters, and Clover will take care of the fuckers in black."

"Right," Jane replied dutifully, and held out her hand. “Radio, please.”

Crowbar handed Jane a walkie-talkie, and she took it and clipped it to the belt on her bright red pantsuit.

"Tell Clover to meet me outside the storage room," Jane ordered him. "Quarters, you flank them on the east entrance, Clover and I will take the west. We'll close them off and corner them."

"What about Die?" Quarters asked.

"We'll just let him play with his dolls for a while longer. He has his radio?"

"He should."

"Then if we need backup, then we'll call him."

The Condesce nodded at her with smug approval.

Jane pretended not to notice, inclining her head towards the exit as she lead Crowbar and Quarters out.

* * *

John was officially having a horrible time.

He was covered in cuts that were bleeding at a rate teetering to the edge of alarming, he was sore, and his snazzy black sweater was torn, covered in blood, and completely ruined. It was such a cool sweater too. God dammit.

"Well that just happened," Dave groaned. “It’s official-we’re fucking dead.”

"Stay optimistic," John muttered, but he couldn't bring himself to put much enthusiasm in his voice.

"We'll get the picture and get out,” Rose panted, hunched over and leaning on her knees. “Like John said, stay optimistic.”

"Forget the picture," Dave snapped. "We have to get out of here. I don’t know what the fuck we were thinking coming here in the first place, but shit’s hitting the fan literally as we speak and if we don’t leave-"

"Fine." Rose cut in. "Forget the picture. We'll get out of here."

John didn't really believe her. She had an excited glint in her eyes, the kind that usually made John wonder if she was crazy.

"Are you okay?" Jade asked worriedly, finally, _finally_ someone was at least _noticing_ that he was covered in blood.

"No," John groaned.

"What happened to you?" Rose asked, suddenly taking notice of his condition.

"Someone pushed me off a barbed wire fence," John said, glaring at Dave.

"Sorry," Dave said, not sounding sorry at all.

“Guys,” Jade said softly. “Look up.”

“What?” John asked. “Where?”

Jade inclined her head sharply. John’s eyes followed the direction and saw a blinking red dot.

Rose’s eyes narrowed. “Is that a camera?”

“Looks like it,” Dave commented. “Does this mean we’re even more fucked than we were before? Because I honestly didn’t think that was possible?”

“Well don’t stare at it!” Jade hissed.

“Why bother?” Dave muttered, a hint of dismay creeping into his voice. “They can already see our faces.”

“Oh no…” Jade groaned.

“Like I said, we’re fucked.”

John frowned. “Wait, if this place is abandoned, why would there be video cameras?”

"Interesting.” Rose began walking away.

“Rose!” John hissed.

Rose either didn’t hear him or ignored him, (probably the latter) and she continued on her way towards the insides of the dark, not-so-deserted factory.

John swallowed down the nervous lump in his throat as he, Jade and Dave exchanged wary glances and followed her.

* * *

 

Meanwhile, Boxcars was hunting. Or, more accurately, being the hunted, since he was playing bait, but no one needed to know that. As far as anyone knew, he was the hunter here. Anybody else who said otherwise could kiss his ass.

But he truly hated being bait. Whenever they encountered the police, Slick's usual go-to plan involved making one of them go out and play bait and lure the fuzz away while the rest of the Crew did their business trying to land a blow on the Felt. To make it fair, or to prevent them from going at each other's throats more accurately, they'd take turns playing bait. But that didn't mean Boxcars had to like it any more.

He gripped his gun in one hand and the ace of hearts in the other, and continued to move through the factory. The fuzz'd probably had discovered where they had broken in, so he'd go there and see if he could lure them away from where Deuce and Droog were setting up the explosives.

Then he heard voices.

At first he thought he was hearing things. Then he thought he was hearing the cops, and had backed behind a doorway, ready to shoot them from behind. But then the supposed cops came hurrying through, and it turned out they weren't cops at all, but a bunch of kids, the way their voice sounded.

He had to stop and wonder about that for a minute.

_Kids._

"Which way do you think they went?" A girl hissed.

"How the hell should I know?" A guy snapped. "John, you doing okay?"

"Yeah," The other guy, John, Boxcars guessed, responded.

_Kids._

_Fucking kids._

Boxcars wanted to beat his head into the wall. The Midnight Crew's last encounter with a bunch of kids had seriously fucked shit up. He wanted nothing to do with any kid, big or small, no kids, goddammit, _no fucking kids._

Then another thought crept into his brain.

_Kids. Here at a deserted factory in the middle of the night._

Why the hell would a bunch of kids be at a deserted factory in the middle of the night?

He immediately reached for his radio and switched it on.

"Slick?" He barked into it. "We have a problem."

Slick's voice crackled from the small speaker. _"What is it?"_

"Kids. There are kids in the factory."

Silence.

_"So? Oh wait-fuck, they aren't the same ones from last time are they? What's his name, Karkar and his friends-"_

"No, one of 'em's name's John."

_"What about the other ones?"_

"Dunno. Want me to follow 'em? They might know Cat-car or whatever his name is, and if they do then..."

Boxcars trailed off. There was a brief pause.

_"No, leave 'em, they ain't important. Just distract the fuzz."_

"A'right."

_"Anything else of particular importance?"_

He sounded impatient.

"No."

_"Good. Now do as I tell ya for fuck's sake."_

The radio went dead, and Boxcars put it back in his coat. He was about to keep moving when he heard the sound of a door breaking down completely, yelling voices, and thundering footsteps. Boxcars let himself sigh, then stormed out past the doorway. Quite a distance away, he could see some of the police officers storming into the hallway. They stopped when they saw him.

"COME AND GET ME YA DICKHEADS!!!!" Boxcars screamed at the top of his lungs.

He turned around again and took off running again just as gunfire ripped through the air and several bullets zipped past him, barely skimming the edge of his coat.

* * *

 

The girl parked the stolen car about a block away from the Betty Crocker Factory. From there, she could hear the gunshots coming from the inside.

Dread gripped her stomach, making her feel like she wanted to throw up. A dear, dear friend of hers was inside, with a maniac coming for their blood. Specifically their blood. She had to warn them. Somehow.

She got out of the car, fumbling for the pistol she had stolen from one of her superiors. She had never used a pistol in her life, but she would try if it would save her friend. She started heading towards the factory, her pace increasing as the gunshots increased.

Her name was Calliope, and as she stumbled through the thick weeds and grass that threatened to ruin her green outfit, she had never been so scared in her life.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Okay, nothing exploded or spontaneously burst into flame upon publishing the first chapter, which is pretty much all I hoped for. Let's see how continuing this thing goes.


	3. Episode 1: Newsflash (Part 3)

**Thursday, 3:37 AM**

The sounds of gunfire rattled Jane, but she steeled herself and forced herself to keep moving. She kept a hand on her gun at all times, ready to pull the trigger should the slightest hint of danger presented herself. If she chose not to focus on the stiff red pantsuit she was dressed in and the matching tiara-top adorning her hair she could almost picture herself as the hardboiled detective she used to dream of becoming when she was younger.

Unfortunately, reality was a bit too pressing for her to ever indulge in that fantasy.

Alright....here was the storage room...but where was Clover?

"Boo!"

"AGH!" Jane jumped back, pulling out her gun, ready to fire. The little imp squealed, and put his hands up.

"No! It's me, don't shoot!"

After taking a second to calm her nerves, Jane lowered the gun and shot an angry glare at Clover.

"Don't scare me like that!" She snapped.

"Sorry sweetie," Clover chirped. His heels clicked together cheerfully, which only grated on Jane's nerves.

"Don't call me that." Jane fingered the trigger of her gun pointedly.

"Sorry." Clover squeaked. "Won't do it again ma'am."

Jane scowled, and lowered her gun again. "Have you gotten any whiff of the Midnight Crew?"

"No, not yet."

"All right." Jane cocked her gun. "Let's keep moving, shall we? They've probably split up by now."

"A'right." Clover pranced up next to her as they started walking again. "Once we find 'em we kill 'em right? Condy's orders?"

"What else?" Jane lied. She had no intention on killing anyone tonight.

She hated the feeling that came with taking a life. Hated it with every fiber of her being. It went against her very nature. But of course, that hadn't stopped her before. There were certain sacrifices one had to make, after all.

* * *

 

When the gunfire started, Rose felt the first twinge of fear of the night and briefly entertained that this little excursion was a terrible idea.

But not for long. Out of sheer determination (and a bit of stubbornness, but she wouldn't admit to that either) she kept moving.

Even though the sound of gunshots were obviously beginning to rattle her companions.

"You're hearing the gunshots too right?" She heard John whisper to Jade.

Jade just frowned worriedly in response and clutched her rifle tighter.

"So Rose," Dave began casually.

"Yes?" Rose responded patiently.

"How are you?"

"I'm fine."

"Really?"

"Yes. How are you, may I ask, on this fine evening?"

"Oh you know. Just in the middle of Battle-fucking-Royale here. Listening to the lovely gunshots ringing through the air."

"Battle Royale is a bit of a stretch, don't you think?"

"Are you not getting my fucking point here Rose?"

"Loud and clear, Strider dear."

"Are you _insane?"_

"Okay," John interrupted, placing one hand of Dave's arm and the other on Rose's. "Okay look guys. I think we need to stop and evaluate what we're doing here."

"Or just leave," Dave pointed out.

"Way to be patient Dave. Look Rose, you need to think for a minute about what you're doing here. You dragged us at three in the goddamn morning to a deserted factory. Fine. You wanted us to help you do recon and spy on a bunch of mobsters? Okay, cool. You want us to go straight into a possible gunfight where people are probably dying? Kind of drawing the line there. Just the fact that we're doing this just so you can get a story for the fucking school newspaper is concerning on its own." John raised his hands. "Just saying."

"Egderp's right," Dave said. "This is probably the stupidest thing anybody has ever done for the school newspaper. The school. Fucking. Newspaper. The oracle of the fucking frogs."

"Fighting frogs," Rose corrected. "You make it sound as though our football team fucks their opponents into surrender."

"And that's a bad thing? That would be kind of badass. Frogs can't fight anyway. What would they do, use their weird-ass tongues to maul their enemies?"

"Some frogs are poisonous."

"I think we're getting off-track," Jade mumbled.

"Right," John agreed. "Okay, Rose, I'm just going to be blunt here, we need to leave. Now."

Rose opened her mouth to respond when a gun cocked.

Directly behind them.

"Don't move kiddies."

They all froze.

"There ya go. Now how about you turn around nice and slow? I don't like killin' folks with their backs turned."

Nobody moved. Rose could feel her veins pumping with adrenaline, her heart slamming into her chest. Jade was clutching her rifle so tightly that her knuckles were white. Dave's eyes were wide behind his shades, and John looked like a caged rabbit.

"Come on. Turn around. I promise I won't shoot. Not yet anyway."

Ever so slowly they turned around to face the speaker.

It was a tall, well-set man with a scowl on his face and a machine gun pointed directly at them. He had a white, green-striped hat with a number 14 emblazoned on the front. But his most striking feature was the fact that his skin was a glowing green color, a bright lime-green that matched his suit.

Rose blinked. For a split second, she was more focused on the green-ness than at the gun pointing at them.

"Uh...." Jade blinked, obviously just as taken aback by the man's color.

"What?" The man snapped, his scowl contrasting with the amusement in his eyes. "Never seen a man with as great as a complexion as mine?"

"Nope," Dave replied lamely.

"Um....are you...." John looked hesitant. "...From the Midnight Crew, or..."

The man's face twisted into a sneer, and it was clear John had asked the wrong question.

"Don't insult me kid," He snapped.

Rose swallowed. Now she was focusing on the gun. She heard Dave swallow down a nervous gulp from next to her.

"Now, one question," The man snapped. "You anybody important?"

"No-no, look, we don't want any trouble," John said, his voice trembling slightly. "We're leaving right now."

"That's right." Rose managed to recompose herself. "We aren't looking for trouble. We'll leave and we won't say a word about what happened here."

The man scowled. "Doesn't matter, doll. You've already gotten in too deep."

"Are-" Jade swallowed again. "Are you going to kill us?"

"Yep." His finger went over the trigger. "Sorry. Technically one of my colleagues was supposed to take care of ya. But I guess I beat 'em to it. Sorry 'bout this, kiddies. Gotta do my job."

Jade's rifle was out in a flash and her finger pulled the trigger. The bullet came out with a loud bang, a neat, precise shit that caused the green man to jerk backwards. A spray of red blood splattered from the hole in his forehead, a stark contrast against the green color of his skin. He stumbled backwards and lost his grip on the machine gun, which thudded to the ground.

"RUN!" Jade screamed.

None of them wasted any time doing so.

* * *

 

His name was Clubs Deuce. Currently, he was setting up almost all of the explosives he had brought along the north wall of the Betty Crocker factory. The plan was for as soon as they were done, Slick (and originally Boxcars, before Slick ordered him to go distract the cops) would lead whatever Felt members that were in the factory towards the explosives, and BAM! Hopefully, they'd be killed.

Hopefully.

For some reason, all the Felt's henchmen never died. They'd all come back, in some unknown way that was beyond Deuce's reasoning. He and the other members of the Crew had mowed all thirteen of them down with gunfire at least once in the past fifteen years, but the supposedly dead Felt would somehow revive and come back to face them again during the next heist.

Hopefully, a really, really big explosion would be able to take at least a few of them out.

"Are you done?" Droog asked impatiently. He stood guard among a vast array of giant ovens, just in case some guy tried to surprise-ambush Deuce while he was setting up explosives.

"Almost!" Deuce replied.

"Hurry up," Droog snapped.

If the Felt's resurrection habit confused Deuce, then it really made Droog mad. He spent a long time trying to figure out how they did it, but the Felt was really good at covering their tracks. He spent years obsessing over it until Slick finally stepped in, told him to stop flipping his shit about it, and said 'it didn't matter how they kept coming back, as long as they found a way to kill the bastards.'

So if the explosion didn't work, Droog would probably flip out. So would Slick and Boxcars, come to think of it, but that was why Deuce had put a lock on his door. Because even though he was always up for a good strifing session, he wasn't as interested as the rest of his Crew in going after each other's throats when they were all upset.

"Did you hear that?" Droog said suddenly.

"No." Deuce stopped fiddling with the explosives and jerked his head upwards to see that Droog's fists had clenched around his gun in anticipation.

"Listen," Droog murmured.

Deuce obeyed. At first he didn't hear anything, but then, vaguely, in the distance, the sound of footsteps were steadily coming closer.

"Company," Droog muttered.

"Where are they coming from?" Deuce asked. He immediately began scanning the long, vast rows of ovens, but saw no one. The footsteps, however, were completely indistinguishable.

"Keep setting those things up," Droog ordered, beginning to slowly creep away into the unknown.

"Okay." Deuce said quickly. He scurried off to continue setting up the explosives. Eventually he lost sight of Droog. He couldn't help but feel a little nervous as he fumbled with the wires on his explosives. It didn't help that he had left his trusty bull cane at the current hideout, which was a bit of a stupidey-dumb move on his part.

Deuce's fingers fumbled, and he accidently dropped an unlit stick of dynamite. He fumbled for it for a minute before it slipped out of his hands, hit the ground, and began to roll.

"Hey! Hey come back!" Deuce would take a minute later to acknowledge the fact that yelling this at a stick of dynamite was pretty pointless, but at the moment he was frantically chasing it as it rolled away and under the oven.

"No!" In dismay, Deuce got on his hands and knees and frantically began feeling around at the bottom of the oven, temporarily forgetting about the footsteps.

Then he heard someone yell "Turn this way!"

And then they were right on top of him.

* * *

 

Jade didn't really have time to muse on the fact that she had actually shot someone.

She and her friends were scrambling frantically away in blind terror, not realizing where they were going. At some point they made it into a long room full of fifty-foot tall ovens that almost resembled a maze.

"Turn this way!" Dave yelled, and dragged the three of them around the side of one of the ovens.

In their haste, they didn't actually check to see if anyone was there. Or more specifically, kneeling right in their path, acting as a roadblock.

Before she knew it, Jade was tumbling over her friends and over a small black lump that yelped and moved and tumbled right along with them. They all ended up sprawled on the floor in a daze.

Head pounding, Jade sat up, her hands frantically groping for her rifle that had slipped from her hands. Almost immediately, she came face-to-face with a small, short guy she didn't recognize.

"AGH!" Jade jumped at the sudden contact.

"AGH!" The guy yelped in response, jumping back enough to crash right into Dave, who was regaining his senses.

"AGH!" John screamed.

"AGH!" The guy screeched again, eyes bugging. He scrambled away from them, back pressing up against the ovens.

"Hey!" Dave sat up, eyes wide and staring at the guy.

"Who are you?" The guy said wildly.

"Who are you?" John retaliated in alarm.

"Uh...." The guy hesitated. Jade, though her nerves still hadn't completely calmed down, took time to study him. He was slightly on the chubby side, and extremely short, shorter than her even. He sported a wide-brimmed fedora, and a slightly rumpled suit. There was something embroidered on his suit pocket, but Jade couldn't make it out in the dim light.

"Who are you?" Dave repeated.

"Uh...." The guy frowned. "Um....who are...you?"

Rose narrowed her eyes in exasperation. John frowned. Jade clutched her rifle in her hands, hoping to heck that the guy wouldn't pull a gun on them too.

"You're not going to kill us are you?" He asked in a panicked tone.

"Uh...I don't know." The guy studied them for a minute, although 'studied' may have been too analytical of a word to fit him. He was actually sort of adorable. His expressions were childlike, almost innocent. "You aren't with the Felt, are you?"

"The what?" Dave asked in confusion.

"The Felt."

"We-we don't know what that is," Rose said slowly. Their nerves were beginning to fade, although they remained on guard. It was kind of hard not too when there were still gunshots ringing in the air.

The guy frowned. "How come you're here then? I don't think you should be here."

"We're leaving," John said suddenly. "Don't worry, we're on our way out right now."

"Okay," The guy replied, looking a little relieved. "Yeah, that's good. Um...yeah, I'm leaving pretty soon too. I think."

"How come?" Dave asked suspiciously. "Who are you?"

"Uh.....well...um...."

At that point, Jade's eyes had remained on the symbol embroidered on the guy's coat pocket, trying to make out what it was. While the rest of her friends were staring at him expectantly waiting for an answer, she finally made out the symbol of clubs. Almost exactly what it looked like on a playing card.

That bit of information took a minute to sit in.

"Guys," She said after the minute was up. "Look at his coat pocket."

"What?" Dave asked.

Rose and John obeyed, and when they saw it, they went stiff.

"You-" John choked out.

"Clubs Deuce," Jade said slowly. "One of the Midnight Crew."

Clubs Deuce's eyes widened. He took a step back.

"Well fuck," Dave grumbled.

"I-" Deuce took a step forwards.

"Stay back!" Jade's rifle was pointed at him in a flash.

"No-no it's okay!" Clubs Deuce looked more flustered than scared. "I-I don't think we hurt kids? We've never really done that before? We've met kids before and we didn't kill them, but-I mean-I'll have to ask Spades, but we've never really done anything like that before, so I think if you guys just go then-"

"Deuce?" A deep, slightly accented voice called somewhere from behind one of the ovens.

"Oh-um-" Clubs looked completely at a loss. Clutching her rifle, Jade took a step back, Rose following suit. John gripped her and Dave's arm in alarm.

John opened his mouth like he wanted to say something right when they heard someone else step towards them. They all whipped around to face another man, who stopped and stared at them in confusion. He was much taller than Clubs, much taller than all of them even, and wore a suit similar to his, except with a tie, and a small, red diamond embroidered on his chest pocket.

"Diamonds Droog," Dave croaked, obviously picking out that last detail at the same time as Jade.

John let out a little 'meep' noise.

"Deuce?" The man asked, his eyebrows pulling together in a tight crease. His hands tightened on the gun Jade suddenly realized he was holding. "What the hell is going on-"

Gun.

He was holding a gun.

Jade's instincts reacted first, and before she knew it, she was pulling the trigger again. Diamonds Droog jerked back as the bullet made impact with his chest, letting out a cry of pain and slumping to the ground.

"Droog!" Clubs cried.

Clubs ran to Diamond's aid, Jade was still trying to comprehend what had just happened, and without warning the sound of machine gun fire ripped through the air. Immediately, Clubs hit the ground, but Jade, John, Rose and Dave were a little slower to respond. They got down quickly enough, but Jade felt something graze her leg with the same intensity as a small flame. She let out a cry that was lost to the sound of gunfire. Dave snatched her by the waist and dragged her and the others behind one of the huge ovens. Almost opposite from them, she saw Clubs Deuce dragging Diamonds Droog to safety.

Jade then looked forward and saw the same green guy from before slowly coming towards them. His machine gun. which had been spouting a steady stream of bullets, stopped suddenly. But he kept walking, slowly and carefully. His eyes were narrowed, and he looked extremely pissed.

Her blood ran cold. 

* * *

 

As the sound of gunfire suddenly picked up again, Jane broke into a run and Clover followed.

"We're gonna get them!" Clover squealed. "They have to be there!"

Jane considered telling him to shut up, but before she got a chance to she heard something slam in to Clover behind her. She whipped around in time to see none other than Spades Slick whip out his knife and slit Clover's throat. Clover let out a gurgle, and then fell silent as Slick threw the little body to the side.

"Why do you even bother killing them?" Jane asked, feeling a little exasperated. "They always come back."

"It's entertaining," Slick said curtly, sticking the blade of his knife between his forefinger and thumb, and with a swift motion, wiped off the blood onto his figers. He then wiped off his hands on his suit coat, and smartly flipped the switch closed, and stuck it back in his pocket. "You better have the package kid. I didn't drag my crew to this godforsaken factory for nothing."

"Trust me, you didn't," Jane replied.

"Good." Slick nodded at Clover. 'How long do we have until he heals himself or respawns or whatever the fuck they do? I always lose track."

"About five minutes. But what I have to tell you will take longer then that. We should go somewhere else. Did you cut the security cameras?"

"All of them up to here, yeah."

"Let's go back to where you came then."

"Fine. Follow me." Slick glared at her, then began to walk in the direction that he had supposedly came. "Felt treatin' you all right? Asking for...well, you know. The others keep buggin' me about you."

"Yes, not bad."

"Good. Give it to me and I'll be on my way."

"Of course. But do you mind hearing my story first?"

Slick sighed impatiently. "Fine. Make it quick."

* * *

 

"YAAAAAAH!!!!"

**_BAM BAM BAM BAM BAM BAM BAM-_ **

Boxcars flew through the hallways at top speed. Bullets impaled themselves into the walls that he passed, barely avoiding contact with Boxcars himself.

Okay, he had to admit he kind of liked this part. But he'd much rather be gutting down a bunch of green guys, and the said green guys actually staying dead for once. Wouldn't that be fucking dandy.

Then he heard more gunfire coming from the direction that he was heading.

He assumed that was the rest of the crew engaging with the Felt. His job was to keep the fuzz away from them, so he made a sharp right turn in the opposite direction. The cops followed suit merely paces behind him.

"Boxcars?!" His radio suddenly crackled to life. _"Boxcars!"_

As he ran, he unclipped the radio and switched it on.

"I'm kinda busy right now Deuce!" Boxcars panted.

**_BAM BAM BAM BAM BAM-_ **

Another burst of gunfire again nearly missed him. Boxcars again made another sharp left.

_"We need your help! Droog's been shot, and Quarters is after us!"_

"Well shoot at 'em!" Boxcars snapped, panic suddenly beginning to set in. Droog was down? Fuck. If Deuce had to fend for himself, he wouldn't stand a chance. "I'm on my way."

"Okay!"

The radio went dead. Boxcars swore under his breath and kept running. How the hell was he going to escape the fuzz?

After a minute, he passed a storage room. He stopped abruptly, checking quickly to make sure the police were at least a few paces behind him, then darted in as soon as they were in view.

Quickly, he got behind the large, heavy metal door that was swung into the inside and waited. The cops all poured in, yelling for him to surrender, and all eventually stopped.

"Hey, where'd he go?"

"You all saw him come here, right?"

"Jesus, he has to be in here somewhere! A big guy like him shouldn't be hard to spot."

Boxcars sneered. _Big guy, my ass._

Taking a deep breath beforehand, Boxcars bolted out from behind the door, and before the cops could comprehend what was happening, he had darted around and back into the hallway **_(BAMBAMBAM)_** swinging the now bullet hole-riddled door shut behind him and finally, bolting it shut.

The cops were yelling again. Boy, they sounded pissed. Boxcars was tempting to make faces at them through the glass panel that peered into the storage room, but refrained, and began dashing again in the direction where the gunfire had picked up again.

**_Morons._ **

* * *

 

Meanwhile, shit was hitting the fan and nobody was that happy about it.

John and his friends had managed to drag themselves behind one of the giant ovens as they watched the gunfight in growing horror. Clubs Deuce, who was kneeling over a still bleeding Diamonds Droog, had pulled out a pistol and was firing in the direction of the green guy. He seemed like he had some idea what he was doing, but his face looked absolutely panicked. John almost felt sorry for the little guy.

The green guy had ducked behind another oven, propping up his machine gun and firing a stream of bullets on and off in the opposite direction. Every time the bullets flew Clubs Deuce ducked, frantically yelling into what looked like a radio. John noticed Diamonds Droog woozily attempting to sit up, but immediately wincing in pain and collapsing against the side of the ovens, blood continuously flowing from his shoulder.

"Oh God," Jade moaned, as she painfully stretched out her leg. John broke his gaze from the Midnight Crew, and to his horror, he saw blood oozing out from Jade's calf.

"Oh shit!" He gasped.

As if things couldn't get worse, the doors burst open, and in came another one, also glowing green. He immediately ducked behind an oven when one of Clubs Deuce's bullet nearly hit him. Once behind it, he pulled out a pistol and began firing shots. From the distance, John could make out a red hat with a white circle emblazoned on the front. And in the middle of the white circle, was either a red banana or the number seven.

"This way!" Dave shouted. He was pulling Jade to her feet, slinging one of her arms over her shoulder. Immediately, Jade positioned herself on one foot, teetering unsteadiliy, but clinging to her rifle stubbornly. John didn't look at him. He couldn't tear his eyes off of the puddle of blood. Then he looked up and saw the green men advancing forward. Clubs Deuce, who was obviously freaking out, were shooting at them frantically, but to no avail. The shots either missed or the green men adverted them by ducking behind more ovens, only to get up and continue moving again.

"John!" Rose yelled, yanking at his arm.

"JOHN WE HAVE TO GO!" Jade screamed.

At that point, another man burst in. He was tall, hulking, and dressed in black that John was beginning to think symbolized the Midnight Crew. The green guys were whoever they were fighting against. Green vs. black. The big man roared, and the gun in his hands exploded with gunfire. The green guys fell to the ground, blood squirting from each of them.

At the sight of the blood, John managed to snap out of it. He let Rose drag him away, following Dave, who was dragging a limping Jade behind him towards the glowing red exit sign John only noticed just now.

* * *

 

The factory seemed deserted, but Calliope could hear the intense sound of gunfire in the distance. Out of the corner of her eye, she noticed a video camera with its wires torn out. Some of the pipes lining the top of the walls had been torn apart and had fallen to the ground. Calliope picked up a stray pipe and held it like a baseball bat.

* * *

 

"Are you sure that's what you saw?"

Slick and Jane had found a place to talk, a hallway a good distance away from where Slick had temporarily took out Clover. The video cameras positioned on the walls had been messily decapitated, courtesy of Slick.

Right now, he was staring at her in shock, almost horror.

"I'm positive."

He was silent for a minute. "Are you completely-"

"Yes!" Jane felt herself shaking slightly. She remembered what she had seen, remembered with a terrible clarity. She knew what she had seen, and she knew it was bad. Very, very bad.

"Are you fucking kidding me?!" Slick snarled, and in a fit of rage slammed a knife into the wall. "This is bad."

"You don't say?!" Jane took a deep breath trying to recompose herself. "What are we going to do? It's not like we can take her out."

"Trust me, I know," Slick replied darkly, and a little sarcastically.

Jane frowned. "If you can notify the others-"

"Not yet," Slick snapped.

"What? But-"

"Not yet."

"But she's after you! If she gets her hands on you-"

"She can't make me tell her anything." Slick tapped his cufflinks, onyx spade-shaped specks the glinted in the dim light. "Roxy made sure of that."

Jane blinked and studied the cufflinks. "Roxy did that?"

"Yeah. She's surprisingly useful when she's not drunk off her ass."

Jane fought to urge to smack him, remind him exactly _whose fault that was,_ but restrained herself. "I still believe you need to notify-"

"No. I can deal with her myself."

"No!" Jane snapped. "You can't go near her!"

"Well what the hell do you expect me to do?!" Slick spat.

"I don't know! But we can't have her running around like she is-"

"Hang on." Slick reached towards his belt, where Jane noticed him flip something on his radio. "Just realized it wasn't on."

 _"Slick?"_ Deuce's panicked voice immediately came crackling through the speaker. _"Slick! Where are you!_ "

"Fuck," Slick muttered, unclipping the radio from his belt. "Yeah?"

_"Slick, where are you? We need you!"_

"What did you do this time?!" Slick snapped.

 _"Slick,"_ Boxcar's voice suddenly came on. He sounded shaken. _"Slick....Droog's down...."_

Silence.

"Slick?" Deuce's voice asked.

Jane glanced at Slick. The set of his mouth had tightened to the point where it looked like it was about to shatter at any moment.

 _"Slick? Ya there?"_ Boxcars' voice, sounding slightly worried.

"I'm coming," Slick muttered. "Where are you?"

_"Dunno...there's-there's a lot of ovens..."_

"I'm on my way." Slick switched off his radio and re-clipped it to his belt.

"I know where that is," Jane said softly.

"Take me there," Slick said flatly.

"All right, but-"

"Now."

* * *

 

The gunshots had finally stopped. Thankfully. Calliope didn't think her nerves could take it.

"Well, look who found her way home."

Calliope whipped around to face a familiar figure halfway hidden by shadow.

"Stay back!" She gasped, holding the pipe out threateningly, hating how her hands were shaking.

"Ooh, a pipe. So scary." The figure yawned lazily.

"Piss off!" Calliope snapped. "You're not killing anyone tonight!"

"Oh yeah...the Crew's here tonight right? Whatever. Fuck those losers. How about I just put you back in your little cage where you belong?"

"You're not putting me back anywhere!"

"Back into your little cage." The figure began slowly coming towards her.

"Stay away from me!" Calliope held the pipe in front of her frantically.

"Your pretty golden cage. How does that sound, little birdie?" He was right on top of her. The smirk was awful. It chilled her to her very core. Fear and terror threatened to overwhelm her until the point where his hand was slowly reaching for his knife. Then something snapped. Calliope swung the pipe.

The thing collided with his temple with a loud crack. His eyes widened, he hadn't expected her to lash out. Without a sound, his eyes rolled back into his head and he collapsed, his dagger clattering to the floor.

For a second, Calliope could only stare in shock. Had she really just done that?

She didn't stick around for him to come to. Immediately, she took off running in the direction where she last heard the gunshots, the gunshots that had worringly come to a stop.

* * *

 

"This way!" Jane led Slick back through the hallways, sprinting at top speed.

"Faster!" Slick growled, only a few paces behind her.

"I'm going-as fast as I can!" Jane panted back.

Eventually, she slowed to a stop. "You go down there, it's the first door to the left," Jane gasped, still panting.

"Okay." Slick skid to a stop. "Almost forgot-give me the package."

Jane doubted he had forgotten, but she drew upon her fetch modus anyway and un-captachalogued a bright red package. Holding it gingerly, she placed it in Slick's outstretched hands. "You have a safe place for it right?"

"No." Slick held it in his hands for a moment, eyeing it warily. But there was a hint of greed there, a hint that made Jane uneasy.

"You don't?!"

Slick tore his gaze away from the package abruptly, and quickly pulled out his deck of cards. "Not yet. But I will. Believe me, I don't want this thing."

Jane stared at him skeptically as Slick's war chest thumped to the ground. He opened it, stuffed the package in, closed it with a sense of finality, and re-captachalogued it.

"Keep in touch," Slick said as he slid his deck of cards back in his suit pocket, and then took off down the hallway. It wasn't long before he disappeared in the dark.

When she was alone, Jane glanced around her to make sure the video cameras had been slashed, which she probably should have done before. Yep, sure enough, they were.

Thank god. That would have ended badly.

She put her gun back in her belt, running towards the direction of the Condesce's office and already devising a story for what happened. Okay, so Slick came in and stabbed Clover, and ran. She had gone after him, but lost him.

Yes. That was good.

* * *

 

"Where the fuck is Slick?" Boxcars growled, as he and Deuce kneeled next to Droog's side, trying to staunch the flow of blood.

"He's coming," Deuce said in an attempt to be reassuring, but his face was just as pale as Droog's, and his eyebrows were knit together in tight worry.

"Where-" Droog mumbled under his breath.

"Don't talk," Boxcars ordered, panic beginning to set in. He tried to remember whether he had stuffed some medical supplies in his Wrath Tub, but didn't think he had the time to get it out and dig around for some.

At that moment, he heard the sound of fast-paced footsteps, and Boxcars whipped around to see Slick rush in, stepping over the bodies of Crowbar and Quarters before hurrying over and kneeling next to Droog.

"What the fuck did you do this time you idiot?!" Slick demanded, once he took in the sight of dreadfully white Droog lying on the ground with blood seeping out of his chest. "How the hell did you manage to get yourself shot?!"

"Blame the kids," Droog mumbled, half-disoriented.

"What?" Slick blinked at him. "What kids-oh." That took a minute to sink in. "You mean the kids you told me about?" He whipped around to glare at Boxcars.

Boxcars felt his eyes narrow. Had one of those kids shot Droog?.

"Wait-" Slick's glare leveled onto Deuce, who shrunk back nervously. Uh oh. "You saw those kids?"

"I-" Deuce swallowed.

"He was talkin' to them...." Droog muttered dazedly, before his head slumped to the side and he passed out.

"Droog?!" Slick shook him.

"He's fine," Boxcars said slowly, mostly to convince himself. "He's still alive, he's just passed out...."

Slick glared at Deuce again. He was practically shaking with rage.

"If Droog doesn't make it," Slick began. "Neither do you, a'right? You better patch him up..."

"Slick!" Boxcars snapped. "It ain't Deuce's fault!"

"How would you-"

"Let's just get out of here, okay?" Boxcars swallowed. "Get back to the hideout. Patch Droog up there."

Slick was silent for a minute.

"Fine," He said finally. "Get back to the hideout. Fine. Deuce, set off those explosives."

"But-"

"Now. It'll help us escape."

Deuce, seeing that it would be wise not to argue, scrambled to his feet and pulled out the detonator.

"Stand back," He said. His voice was trembling.

Boxcars hefted Droog up by the armpits and dragged him to the side. Slick followed, and stood, arms crossed, next to them.

"Okay..." Deuce swallowed. "Three....two...."

* * *

 

Calliope was in what she was starting to refer to as the oven room. Up ahead, she could see three, no, four men in black. One was unconscious and bleeding in another's arms. Another had a scarred eye and an eye patch. She recognized said eye patch.

Heart pounding, she began to run towards them.

* * *

 

Slick heard the footsteps before the rest of his Crew did. When he turned around he saw a girl dressed in green, running towards them with panic written across her face.

It took a minute for him to recognize her.

"One!" Deuce finished, and his finger pressed the button on the detonator.

"Deuce, wait!" Slick yelled, but it was too late.

**_KA-BOOM_ **

* * *

 

The explosion made the ground underneath them shake, even though they had managed to get through the back door. It nearly caused Dave to lose his balance, which was already skewed because he was the one lugging Jade around.

"Holy shit," John gasped for approximately the tenth time that night.

"Where the hell did you park your car Rose?" Dave snapped.

"I-" Rose looked panicked for a minute, when there came a stream of loud barking from behind the fence. Bec. "There! Hurry!" She turned around and dashed down the few steps leading back down to the grass and towards the wire fence again. John trailed after her at top speed.

"All right." Dave was about to follow her, but a flash of movement caught his eye. But when he stopped and looked, there was nothing there.

"Dave!" Jade hissed.

"Okay, I'm going I'm going!" As Dave helped Jade down the steps, he cast one last glance over his shoulder, but everything remained still. When they were on the grass and hobbling towards the fence, they heard shouts and saw the light of a flashlight bob around the corner.

 _"Fuuuuck,"_ Dave gasped, and increased his pace until he got to the fence. He helped Jade climb on top, but she immediately recoiled in pain.

"I can't make it," Jade cried softly.

"Like hell you can't!" Dave leaped up and began scaling the fence, practically dragging Jade behind him. She cried out multiple times in pain, but Dave forced himself to ignore her. He wasn't leaving her behind. John and Rose were already on top holding up the barbed wire for them. Bec had found his way below the fence, barking like a maniac. Dave helped Jade get through and underneath it just as multiple shouts reached their ears. Someone had spotted them.

"Jump!" Rose gasped.

They didn't exactly jump, just let themselves fall and tumble onto the grass below. They immediately slid down the little hill leading up to fence and let themselves tumble down until they reached the bottom.

Jade looked like she wanted to scream in pain, but John clapped his hand over her mouth. Dave heard her muffled groan.

"Ow!" John hissed, pulling his hand back. "You bit me!"

"I'm sorry," Jade moaned, her face contorted in so much pain she looked like she was near tears. Bec immediately whined, and pawed close to her protectively.

"Shh!" Rose hissed.

They all went still. Dave's mind was reeling in panic.

_Holy fucking shit, the police will catch us and shoot us or arrest us and we'll be **DEAD** we'll be so fucking **DEAD,** holy shit holy shit holy shit..._

But as the seconds ticked by, no policemen leaped over the fence or came around the bend, brandishing handcuffs or guns. Apparently, they hadn't spotted them. They were probably just yelling about the explosion or something.

There was a few more gunshots, and they all tensed. A few more seconds, and there was no more gunfire. No more yelling. There wasn't a sound.

It was over. Hopefully.

"Let's go," Rose finally said after a minute.

"I can't," Jade moaned. "Oh God, it hurts...."

"It's okay," John said worriedly. "We'll-uh-carry you-"

"Yeah..." Dave said slowly. "Yeah. Let's just get the hell out of here."

"Please," Jade practically begged. Her face was rapidly turning white, becoming almost like a small beacon in the dim light. Bec whined again.

"My car's not far," Rose said reassuringly, but even she looked worried. "Let's just go."

* * *

 

The explosion had been stronger than they had anticipated, and they'd all been knocked off of their feet. Slick's ears were ringing as he groggily sat up, but he was brought back to reality when he heard the cops yelling.

"Go!" Slick hissed. He prodded a woozy Deuce up and to his feet, and then whirled around to see Boxcars struggling to his feet and slinging Droog over his shoulder. "Go, go, go!"

They took off running. The explosion had taken out part of the wall, which was perfect for an exit. They dashed through it, pushing away a few bricks in their path and ran through the grass. The dew soaked its way into Slick's shoes and on the hems of his pants. He felt a couple bullets whiz by him, not to his surprise, and he realized the cops had taken alert to their presence and were firing at them. Okay, maybe this particular escape wasn't his best idea, but if they ran fast enough they should be okay.

They went through the section of the fence Deuce's explosives had blasted through earlier, and headed in the direction of the car. Slick fumbled for his keys as they tumbled in, slamming the door shut behind them. Technically, he shouldn't be driving as he had no peripheral vision, but there wasn't time to focus on small details. A bullet shattered the passenger side window, and a few more hit the doors.

_Nice aim you dumb fucks!_

It was tempting to scream it out loud, but he refrained from doing so. He started the car, and as soon as the engine rumbled to life he floored it. The car sped away, taking a few more bullet holes along the way but nevertheless making it out in one piece.

However, Slick kept the pedal to the metal, shooting a glance at the three in the back to make sure all of them weren’t dead. Yep, they seemed fine, with the exception of Droog, who still looked like he was on his way out.

Slick forced his gaze back to the road, clenching the steering wheel so hard that his knuckles turned white. Having no peripheral vision, he had to keep turning his head side to side and focus on the road, which was hard when your second-in-command was possibly bleeding to death in the backseat.

It was then when his mind turned to the girl in green and his stomach sank, quickly contorting in nausea.

* * *

 

His head was killing him. He briefly wondered if he had a concussion, but since he could still see somewhat straight he suspected not.

Stupid little bitch. What the hell was so hard about staying in her fucking room?

As he stepped into the room with all of the ovens, he took a minute to regard the bodies of none other than Quarters and Crowbar. But it looked like both were going to heal themselves soon, so at least that was two less bodies he had to get rid of.

But then, as he walked a little more into the room and saw the gaping hole in the wall, he noticed that amid the rubble, there was one more body.

Calliope lay amid the rubble, eyes halfway closed. Her head was twisted at an unnatural angle, and several dark spots had appeared on her stupid green suit.

He went over and nudged her body in the ribs a few times. Just to make sure she was dead.

Sure enough, she was.

Delight spread its way through him. The Midnight Crew had killed Calliope. Accidentally, probably. Well, wasn't that one less pain in the ass he had to deal with? And her brother would be happy too. And when the stupid brat was happy, his life was so much fucking easier.

"Is that the boss's daughter?'

Well. Crowbar, the useless asshole, had finally gotten up on his feet. He turned around to face the green man, who staggered up to him. Blood stained his suit, and he still didn't look completely healed. But that was probably expected, as they had kinda pumped him full of metal.

"Yeah," He replied. "Good riddance."

"Ugh...." At this point, Quarters was groggily standing up, wincing in pain, but fell silent when he saw him.

"Eh." Crowbar shrugged. "I kinda liked her. Besides her annoying tendency to help out the enemy, she wasn't that bad."

His eyes narrowed. "Exactly. She helped out the enemy. Talk that way about her again, and I'll rip your fucking tongue out."

"Fine." Crowbar said boredly. "What should we do with the body?"

"Take it the incinerator," He said dismissively.

"You sure? I kinda feel like we should take it up with the Doc first."

"The Doc doesn't give a shit about traitors. The sooner she's gotten rid of, the better." He glared at Crowbar. "Take her and go hide out. The police will be swarming the joint soon enough. This place is supposed to be abandoned, remember?"

"Condy's gonna be pissed," Crowbar pointed out. "Can you do me a favor and give me orders that'll allow me to avoid her?"

"Sure, whatever. Just stay the fuck out of sight!" He snapped.

Crowbar obediently went forward and gathered up Calliope's limp body. He growled, and turned his back as he heard Crowbar's footsteps walk away, Quarters following right behind him.

 

***END OF EPISODE ONE***

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> So it's been three chapters and someone's already dead. Though don't worry, Calliope will be back. Eventually. 
> 
> Also I came up with a highly unnecessary format for this story that is very highly unnecessary. Basically the chapters are divided up into "episodes." Each "episode" is 2-3 chapters long. Why? I have no idea. I just like making things more complicated.


	4. Episode 2: Showtime (Part 1)

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I was originally going to add some pesterlogs in this chapter, but I severely underestimated how much a pain in the ass formatting pesterlogs on AO3 is. No matter what I do it doesn't. 
> 
> Fucking. 
> 
> WORK. (Insert screaming here)
> 
> So for now, please be patient as I screw around with the formatting and enjoy this totally marvelous FILLER CHAPTER. Seriously though. Nothing real exciting happens. Everyone just gets a little breather after what happened at Crocker's. I'll either add the pesterlogs to this chapter or I'll start the next chapter off with them, because they're sort of necessary to get the ball rolling. I'll most likely do the latter.

                Rose drove like a crazy woman  all the way to the opposite side of the town. John thought about pointing out she was going in the wrong direction of their houses, but was still trying to comprehend everything that had just happened.

                And a lot had happened. Dear god had shit hit the fan.

               He was mainly still focused on the green guy. John didn't know what the hell was up with that. Aliens? No, that was stupid. Or was it? He didn't even know anymore. Maybe he needed more time for everything to sink in. 

                Finally, Rose's car pulled to a stop. John heard her take a few deep breaths before resting her head on the steering wheel. 

                "Are we going to go home now?" John asked her after a minute. He winced as he turned around to look at her. He certainly hadn't forgotten about the various cuts and bruises that marked different places throughout his body. They were all definitely going to be sore in the morning.

                "Yes." Rose lifted her head up. "I supposed I just...needed a brief moment..."

                Bec let out a little whine. The huge dog was right next to Jade's side, licking away the blood on her leg and resting his massive head in her lap protectively.

                "You all saw the green guy right?" Dave finally said slowly. He was sitting on Jade's other side, her leg propped up in his lap. His voice sounded calm, but John could sense the panic in there somewhere. "You know. The fucking. Glowing. Green guy."

                "Uh huh," Jade gasped. John noticed that her face was flushed in pain. The bullet had cut right through her pants creating a messy, bloody rip, and blood was seeping through the fabric.

                "Fuck," John said, his stomach sinking. "I almost forgot you were hurt." 

                Rose turned around. "How is it?"

                "Let me see..." Jade winced as she began to roll up her pant leg. 

                "Here...." Dave reached over and helped her. Jade hissed a little when the fabric was peeled off the wound and off of her skin. John felt himself flinch at the sight of the open wound. 

                "Shit," Rose muttered after a minute. Bec whined again.

                "Actually, I think it just grazed me," Jade murmured. "It got deep though. But I have bandages at home," Jade murmured. Her eyes flickered over to John. "What about you John? Are you okay?"

                "Yeah," John lied. "Don't know what I'm going to say to my dad though."

                "Oh fuck," Dave groaned. "When they find out they're going to kill us." 

                "If," Rose murmured. "If they find out." 

                They were quiet for a minute. At that point, John's mind was slowly beginning to unravel the gravity of the situation. 

                Obviously, there was something big going on over there. Something beyond them.

                And John wanted nothing to do with it. Absolutely nothing. But people had seen them at the factory. And not just any people. The fucking Midnight Crew. And possibly aliens too, or whatever the fuck they were.

                "Goddammit Rose," Dave groaned. "This was a great fucking idea you had."

                Rose shrugged. "I did get pictures."

                John stared incredulously at her. "When?!"

                "Here and there." Rose sighed. "Although I will admit our excursion got a bit too...eventful for my tastes."

                "No shit," Dave grumbled. John caught a glimpse of his eyes behind the shades. He did not look happy. John personally wasn't too mad at Rose-which was weird, but maybe he was too beat up to give a shit at the moment-and Jade didn't seen too angry either, but Dave looked pissed. John couldn't really blame him, Rose had pretty much dragged them all to a near-demise, but at the moment John thought that they had more important things to worry about.

                "I apologize Jade," Rose murmured. "And you, John. It wasn't my intention for anyone to get hurt."

                "It's okay Rose," Jade replied, giving her a cheerful, but somewhat weak grin. "All things considered it actually turned out okay. I mean, we're not dead, so that's pretty good."

                "I don't know guys," John said slowly. "What if they come after us?"

                "No way." Dave snorted. "They wouldn't..."              

                "They wouldn't," Rose repeated firmly, but John noticed she didn't add any evidence to prove her statement like she normally did. 

                "They might." Jade's face was even paler than before. "I shot Diamonds Droog..."

                "It's okay," John told her.

                "No it's not! What if-what if he dies?"

                "Jade-"              

                "I might've killed someone!" Jade covered her face with her hands and let out a little moan. Bec licked her cheek, but she still looked upset.

                "It wasn't your fault," Dave said firmly. "You were scared. He pulled a fucking gun on you. And you just happened to have a rifle in your hands."              

                "Yeah, but..." Jade began to tremble a little. "Even if he doesn't die...what if they try and come after us? For revenge or something? I don't think they'll like it that one of them got shot..."

                Silence. John felt like a small steel brick had suddenly dropped right into the center of his stomach.

                "We should go to the police," John murmured.

                "Are you fucking crazy?" Dave snapped. "And get arrested? No way!" 

                "Seriously?! Wouldn't you rather go to prison for a year or two than to end up fucking dead?!"

                "They won't come after us," Dave said firmly. "So a few kids from the suburbs saw them in action. Big fucking whoop. They have bigger things to worry about. Probably. Why would they bother tracking us down? There's a bunch of kids who live here. They would have to go through the entire town to find us. Sure they're a big badass gang, but hunting us down would be a fucking massive waste of time on their part."

                "They could still track us down," John snapped. "This town isn't that big!"

                 "John, seriously. Pretend for a minute you're a mobster. Pretend you're a big evil fucking badass."

                "That'll probably never happen."

                "Hey you never know. The darkness within and shit like that. You could be a scary little motherfucker underneath all of that dorky idiot exterior." 

                "Thanks for the personal endorsement Dave."

                "Anyway, so some kids see you commit murder. Now, you don't know the kids, and you're committing a murder in a place where people already kind of know where you're at, and you're murdering because murder is what you do and everyone knows you do it. The kids run. There are cops on your ass. You have a choice between running from the cops and hunting down the kids, which could take a while. What do you do?"

                John frowned. Dave had kind of lost him for a minute there, but he did actually have a point. 

                “We’ll be fine,” Rose said firmly.

                “You really think so?” John asked.

                “Well I’m definitely not driving all the way to the police station tonight. It’s on the other side of town.” 

                “Okay, but what are we supposed to do now?”

                "We...." Jade swallowed. "Can we just get home?"

                They turned to look at her.

                "What can we do tonight?" Jade asked softly. "It's better we just go home, get some rest, and-I don't know....think about it before we make a decision."

                They were silent. 

                "Well," Rose said after a minute. "I agree with that idea, and since I'm driving my word is law."

                Rose turned the key, starting the engine again. The car rolled out of its parking spot and began to move. They were silent again for a minute as they cruised silently down the road.

                "Let's agree on something," Dave muttered. "No more trying to hold photoshoots for sociopathic mobsters." 

                "No promises," Rose muttered back. “I might get another urge somewhere down the road.” 

                "Rose, that isn't fucking funny and I'm kind of mad at you right now so please shut up." 

                "All right, I suppose I don't blame you. I was just trying to...what's it called? Break the ice is all."

                Bec whined again, and settled his head back on Jade's lap. They all fell silent.

                "Hey guys," Jade said after a minute. "What do you think...I mean....the green guy....that-that was weird."

                "Really fucking weird."

                "Yeah," John said. Again, John had no idea what the fuck to think about the green guy. Literally no idea at all.

                "Maybe...." Jade swallowed. "I just want to forget about it.” 

                "Yeah," John agreed quietly. He looked at Rose and Dave to see if they had anything to add, but they remained silent. Rose's eyes remained on the road, and Dave was focused on looking out the window. John winced when he had to move his head again, and just decided to rest it against the headrest, letting his eyes close in the process. 

                But when he closed his eyes, he swore he could still hear the sound of gunfire and explosions ringing in his ears.

* * *

 

                It was sort of ironic, but Deuce, the dynamite guy and admittedly the least capable member of the Crew, was the resident nurse. At least next to Droog, of course. They sure as hell weren't going to have Deuce be the only guy who knew first-aid when they were on heists. Otherwise they would be in serious trouble.

                When they had first formed the Crew, they had all tried to learn at least some rudimentary first-aid in case they ran into trouble. Of course, being the tag-along idiot he was, Deuce had too. The rest of them had sort of dismissed the idea of Deuce having any medical knowledge whatsoever, and accepted Droog as the main doctoring force out of the four of them because, well, he was Droog. But on a particularly tricky heist Slick, Droog and Boxcars had all been knocked off the roof of the two-story house they had been robbing (long story) and had ended up with a nasty concussion and several broken ribs apiece. They had been far from their home territory, and Deuce was the only one not out of commission. Since then, they haven't questioned Deuce's medical skills once.

                They certainly weren't going to question him now. 

                "He lost a lot of blood," Deuce reported, sounding uncharacteristically official. He hovered over Droog, who was still passed out and was lying on the couch, shirt open and wound exposed. They had had to sneak him through the back of the motel to avoid being spotted by the staff and the other guests. Thankfully, the motel they had chosen to hide out in was pretty much deserted. 

                "But I don't see any signs of internal bleeding," Deuce continued. "And I think it just missed his lung. I'm pretty sure I can take out the bullet." 

                "So he's gonna be all right?" Slick asked impatiently. He and Boxcars were sitting in chairs they had dragged from the small kitchen next to the couch, watching anxiously as Deuce probed at the wound. 

                "Uh-huh." Deuce looked visibly relieved. "Where's the tweezers?" 

                "Here." Boxcars passed the said instrument over. 

                "Thank you." Deuce said politely, taking them and beginning to dig around in Droog's shoulder. 

                Slick fiddled with his knife as he watched Deuce dig around in Droog's chest with the pair of tweezers that came out of some lady's purse that one of them, Slick couldn't remember who, had swiped a few months ago. The tweezers were obnoxiously pink and leopard-print. Slick hated them with a passion, but at the same time there wasn't really much he could do about it. Which only made him hate them even more.

                On the small table next to the couch, there was a bottle of rubbing alcohol, a needle and thread, some bandages, and a bottle of beer, which Droog would probably need when he came to. Boxcars grabbed the bottle and took a sip.

                "Where the hell were you?" Boxcars asked after downing the drink. 

                It took Slick, who was lost in his own thoughts, a minute to realize that Boxcars was addressing him.               

                "What?" 

                "Ya said you were leading away the Felt. And then in comes Crowbar and Quarters. Where the fuck were you?"

                "I was stuck dealing with a certain little runt," Slick snapped. 

                "Clover? It took ya a while to deal with Clover?" Boxcars stared at him skeptically. He definitely wasn't that quick of a thinker, but at the same time, he sure as hell wasn't stupid. And he had a specific instinct that usually let him know if something was amiss, which was both useful and fucking annoying.

                "Yeah. Fuckin' little bastard snatched my good knife and ran off with it. Probably to piss me off. I was in the middle of stabbing his sorry ass when you called."

                "Any chance he died fer good this time?" 

                "Hopefully, but who the fuck knows?" 

                Boxcars studied Slick for a minute, though Slick wasn't worried. Honestly, if there was anything he had gained in the past miserable fucking decade it would have to be becoming increasingly better at lying. After a while, it just came naturally. Which was a relief, considering all the other absolute bullshit he had to deal wit.          

                Boxcars turned his attention back to the bottle and took a long, deep swig. Slick suddenly felt jealous, suddenly realizing just how much he wanted a drink at the moment.

                 "Can I have some of that?" Slick gestured to the bottle. 

                "Yeah." Boxcars passed Slick the bottle.

                Slick picked it up, but as soon as he did his fingers spasmed, and the bottle fell to the floor, shattering open with a crack.

                "Fuck," Slick hissed.

                "Huh?" After he had deposited the bullet on the table, Deuce looked up from Droog's wound over to the broken glass. "What happened?"

                 Slick pulled off one of his gloves that was still speckled with blood and ashes from their excursion to Crocker's. His skeletal, metal hand twitched for a minute, then gave off a spark.

                "Fuck!" Slick swore again. He rolled up his sleeve, revealing the rest of his robotic arm, and winced. Stupid fucking wire, he hated it so fucking much... 

                "It's glitching again?" Droog's voice mumbled painfully, almost from out of nowhere.

                Slick looked up, momentarily forgetting his arm. Droog's eyes were half-open, his face was contorted with both pain and annoyance, probably because of the pain.

                "Don't move Droog," Deuce said worriedly. "I still need to bandage you up."

                "Erm.." Droog mumbled.

                "Ya alive?" Boxcars asked, standing up and to Droog's bedside. 

                "Uh huh. Did something break?"              

                "No," Slick said quickly, knowing that if beer stained the carpet Droog would be griping in his ear about it as soon as he was back on his feet.

                 "Liar. I heard something break. I really don't want to clean it up."

                 "Yer not going to," Boxcars snapped. "Ya ain't gonna be cleanin' up anything fer a while."

                 "Well it's not like any of you are going to do it-" Droog hissed painfully when Deuce pressed the first layer of bandages against the wound.

                 "Sorry," Deuce said guiltily. 

                Droog glared at him, then turned his attention back to Slick.              

                "Your arm's glitching again, isn't it?"               

                "It's fine." 

                Just when Slick said that, his metal fingers sparked, then twitched for a minute before going still. Slick winced, and Droog rolled his eyes. 

                "I'll fix it later," Slick said after a minute's pause.               

                "Sure." Droog winced again when Deuce applied the last of the bandages, then sat back wearily. 

                "Done," Deuce announced. 

                "Want some?" Boxcars offered Droog the bottle. 

                "Please." Droog normally would decline beer in favor of wine, but alcohol was alcohol and Slick sure as hell didn't blame him considering the circumstances. 

                "Not too much," Deuce pointed out.

                "Uh-huh." Droog gulped down half the bottle within a few seconds, and Deuce's nose wrinkled in irritation. He always looked like a fucking bunny when he did that, which frustrated Slick to no end. In their line of work, they had to look scary, threatening-like. For the most part, they did a good job. And then there was Deuce.

                "So," Slick began, clearing his voice for good measure. Immediately, the Crew's eyes were on him. "What the hell is it with those kids I kept hearing about?"

                "Oh yeah." Droog winced. "One of them was the one who shot me." 

                "What?!" 

                "Yeah." 

                "You're shitting me. You got shot by a kid?" 

                "Pretty much."               

                "Are you fucking kidding me?!" Slick groaned. "Wait. Was it the girl who-"

                "No."

                "Good. But still, goddammit Droog! No one better find out, ya hear? That's completely embarrassing, both to you and to me."               

                "Uh-huh," Droog muttered, too-well, shot, to care. 

                "What did they look like?" Slick snapped. 

                "Can I have my newspaper?" Droog asked. 

                "No, shut up." 

                "She wasn't that young," Deuce pointed out meekly. 

                "That's right." Slick suddenly turned on him, his voice dropping down to a menacing hiss. He wanted to stab him, he wanted to stab him so bad... "You were talking with them, weren't you?"

                 Deuce shrunk back a little. "I-they-they ran into me-they just -they ran into me, and we started talking-"

                "Oh, perfect! You're in enemy territory, and-oh look! Some kids with a gun run into you! _Let's talk to them!"_  

                "Well-" Deuce looked nervous, and he had better be. Slick was ready to stab his ass to kingdom come if he said something that pissed him off even more than he already was. "I don't know! They're kids! They couldn't have been that dangerous!" 

                "Oh yeah? What if they were working for the Felt? What if that girl or whoever turned around and killed you?! What would you have done then, huh? You fucking idiot, you don't STOP AND FUCKING TALK TO THEM THAT IS THE LAST THING YOU WANT TO DO YOU MORON-"

                "Breathe Slick," Droog muttered as Deuce shrank back against the wall and Boxcars rested a restraining hand on Slick's shoulder. "Now what exactly happened with them?"

                Slick growled irritably and slashed the blade into Boxcars' fingers. The big guy just sighed, wiping the blood off on his pants. Deuce looked warily between them.          

                "Well-uh-" He scratched the back of his head. "I don't remember all of it-"              

                "Fantastic!" Slick declared sarcastically. 

                "Okay, okay, so I asked them if they were working for the Felt, but they didn't know what that was-"

                "They could've just been playing dumb-" Slick began, but got a swift jab in the ribs by an elbow. As Slick gave Boxcars a furious look and a swipe on the arm with a switchblade, Deuce looked uneasily between them, but continued. 

                "And they seemed kinda freaked out about everything that was going on, but they figured out who I was 'cause of our symbols we have on our coats, and then Droog came in, and they were even more freaked out, so the girl shot him." Deuce bit his lower lip. "I dunno. I don't think they were working for the Felt. They looked pretty scared. Why do we keep our symbols on our coats if we don't want people to find out who we are? It’s kind of obvious don’t you think?" 

                Slick decided to just ignore the question, Droog was the one who dealt with their tailoring anyway, not him. "Okay, then answer this. If they really were just some random kids from the street, then what the fuck were they doing in a dark, deserted factory surrounded by police guys in the middle of the night?" 

                "I don't know..." 

                "Exactly." Slick took a deep breath, trying to calm himself down. He had to think now, and he knew he couldn't really think straight if he didn't have a clear head. "I'm debating whether or not we should kill ‘em."

                "We'd have to find 'em first," Boxcars pointed out.

                "Well, this town ain't that big. It shouldn't take too long." 

                "I don't think we particularly need to," Droog muttered. 

                Everyone glanced over at him in surprise. 

                "I don't see the point." Droog shrugged, a scowl forming on his face. "There are more cons than pros in going after them. For one, they only saw us in action. They didn't see anything that compromises our current position. If they found out where we were hiding, or found out our real names or something, then I'd say we kill them. But they didn't so what's the point? Killing them now would only give the local police more fuel to find us. Think about it-this is a nice little suburban town, but they have a pretty big police force. Killing a few local teenagers will piss them off. The plan was to look into how much Felt activity is going on in this town and then head back to our turf. We need to do that as quietly as possible. We don't need an entire squad of fuzz on our asses the entire time."                

                Slick glared at him. "I'm kinda surprised you don't want to kill them."               

                Droog growled a little. "Trust me, it's tempting."

                "He's right boss," Boxcars said gruffly. "Killin' 'em would just cause trouble for us. 

                "Okay fine. We won't kill them. But I still wanna know who they are. By any chance did either of you-" He gestured between Deuce and Droog. "Recognize them?"               

                "Nope," Droog muttered, looking as though he really wanted to go to sleep right then and there. Deuce shook his head. 

                "Great. Okay, so how old were they again?" 

                "They looked like they were approximately in high school," Droog said.

                "Okay. What's the local high school in this town?" No one answered. Slick sighed irritably. 

                "I'm assuming something called Skaia High School...or Skaia Academy....or something along that line," Droog muttered.

                "Fantastic. Oh hey, wait a minute...don't they have a computer in the lobby?"              

                "Yeah," Boxcars replied. "It's probably real shitty though."

                "Great. Deuce, get cleaned up and then go down and look up all the high schools here." 

                "Okay." Probably a little anxious to get out of Slick's sight, Deuce scampered off into the other room, supposedly to get changed.

                "So what's the point of findin' out who they are?" Boxcars grumbled. 

                "So we know who they are dipshit!" Slick snapped. "That way, if they decide to make trouble, we can pay 'em a visit. And if we ever run into 'em, we should try to scare 'em a bit just so they remember who the fuck they're dealing with." 

                "Great." Droog muttered. "Can I have my newspaper now?" 

                "No. Deal with it." Slick stood up and stalked out of the room. 

                “The hell are you going?”            

                “I’m done with this shit. Good fucking night.” Slick let the door slam behind him as he stalked into the master bedroom. The end result of tonight’s heist was gradually eroding his already limited patience, and he could feel a headache coming on that was probably going to turn into a migraine.

                Double-checking to make sure the door was closed, Slick set down the war chest and opened it up.

                The package was sitting neatly on top. 

                Fuck.

                He had just wanted to get some scotty dogs, but now...

                His fingers brushed the surface of the package. It was so, so tempting to open it. Use it for himself. Jane had been pretty stupid giving it to him.

                The headache only got worse, pounding in his head and feeling like it was rattling the insides of his skull. Slick gritted his teeth. He could hear Boxcars and Droog beginning to bitch at each other from the other room, which was not helping in the slightest. 

                Slick slammed the war chest shut, turning it back into a deck of cards. He kicked off his shoots and dove into bed, grabbing a pillow and shoving it against his face. 

                He could still hear the package practically calling to him from across the room.

   
  


	5. Episode 2: Showtime (Part 2)

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I am not dead, finals were just a killer.
> 
> Btw I still have no idea what I'm doing when it comes to formatting pesterlogs and it's probably obvious.

**Friday, 7:30 AM**

The next morning John woke up stiff, sore, and having no memory of falling asleep. 

Wincing, he got out of bed. Seemed like he hadn't bothered changing, because he was still in the dark sweatshirt and jeans. Both articles of clothing were ripped and stained with his own blood. He figured that after Rose dropped him off he must have passed out pretty hard.

God. What the hell was he supposed to say to his dad?

After a minute of pondering this somewhat frantically, John decided the best option would be to take a shower and go from there.

He poked his head out of his room, checking the hallway to make sure that Dad was nowhere in sight. He wasn't, but he could hear someone moving around in the kitchen downstairs.

Slowly, he tiptoed ninja-stealth style out of his bedroom and took a moment to feel awesome doing so.

Then he heard a door slam somewhere in his house, and he panicked. He fumbled towards the bathroom, nearly tripped over the carpet, and then slammed the bathroom door a little more loudly than necessary, locking it for good measure.

Panting, John listened for a minute. After a few seconds, he heard the sound of a car starting outside, an engine revving, and then what sounded like wheels pulling out of the driveway.

His dad must have been leaving.

Yes! Crisis averted! He was now free to do what he wished, no questions asked!

Feeling a little better about his situation, John started running the water. The shower handle squeaked loudly as he adjusted the water to warm. As steam began to fill the bathroom, John stripped, wincing as the fabric ran against his cuts and various other injuries the wrong way. Discarding the ruined clothes to the ground, he stepped in the shower and began scrubbing the dried blood off his skin. He gritted his teeth as he carefully wiped down his wounds, figuring they were probably dirty enough to get infected if he wasn't careful. A few of the lacerations started bleeding again, and the blood trickled down to join the water down the drain.

Images from the night before came flooding back. John swallowed, and pushed them out of his mind.

 _Not gonna think about it,_ he thought. _At least until I have to figure out what to do about it. Until then, I'm just going to pretend it never happened._

Yeah. That sounded good.

Ten minutes later John stepped out of the shower, drying off and wrapping the towel around his waist. He then opened the medicine cabinet, looking for band-aids or gauze or something to wrap and hide his cuts with. He found a box of Ghostbuster band-aids and a roll of gauze, so he took both and went back to his bedroom to get changed.

After pulling on some underwear, John wrapped the gauze around the various places the stupid barbed wire had cut him around his arms and a few places on his legs, and taped them into place. He used the band-aids to cover up the smaller lacerations on his sides and stomach, then stopped to look at himself in the mirror.

He actually looked kinda badass, like he'd been in a fight or something. Minus the Ghostbuster band-aids. Puffing up his chest, John gave his reflection his best Nic Cage stare.

After a minute of doing this John realized that he looked like an idiot and stopped, sincerely glad that no one had seen him do that.

After throwing on a long-sleeve and a sweatshirt to cover up the gauze, John checked the clock and realized that if he didn't hurry, he was going to be late for school. He hurried downstairs to grab something to eat. His footsteps sounded almost eerie as they echoed through the empty house, almost like how they did when he was running through the factory...

Nope. Wasn't going to think about that yet. 

John entered the kitchen. Let's see, what was on the menu for today? He scanned the kitchen, spotting a loaf of bread sitting almost perfectly next to the toaster.

Aha! Toast. Everyone loved toast.

He unwrapped the loaf of bread, stuck a couple of pieces in the toaster, and pushed down the button-lever-thingy, making the toast disappear down the slot-thingy. What were those things called? The toaster lever? The toaster slot? The toaster lever and the toaster slot. Yeah, he'd have to look it up.

John went to the cabinet, and opened up the doors. What was toast without jam? He pulled a jar of jam out of the cupboard and stopped when he noticed that it was bright red.

Strawberry.  
  
Bright red strawberry.

Red like blood.

_(Like how Jade was bleeding after she was shot in the leg...)_

Immediately, John put the jar back and closed the cabinet.

Who liked jam with toast anyway? Butter with toast was way better. Everybody knew that.

The toaster dinged. John pulled out the pieces of bread, and ate them plain. He hated butter on toast.

After finishing, John went to the doorway to grab his backpack so that he could be on his way to school. Almost immediately, he saw the folded note resting on top of his backpack, and went to pick it up, open it, and read it.

 **SON,**  
**I HAVE TO LEAVE FOR WORK EARLY, AND WILL MOST LIKELY BE GONE MOST OF THE DAY.**  
**I PACKED YOU A LUNCH IN CASE YOU SLEPT IN TOO LATE AND HAD TO RUSH TO SCHOOL. I SINCERELY HOPE THAT WAS NOT THE CASE.**  
**NEVERTHELESS, CONTINUE BEING A WELL-RESTED INDIVIDUAL.**  
**I AM VERY PROUD OF YOU.**

John rolled his eyes, but stuffed the lunch in his backpack anyway.

Soon enough, John was leaving the house, using his spare key to lock the door, and then he was on his way to walk the couple blocks it took him to get to school.

It was a cool autumn day. Dry, brittle leaves dropped from random trees and joined their fallen comrades in piles on the ground. It was a pretty day, and John had a feeling he would enjoy it if he wasn't so goddamned tired.  

It didn't take him long to reach school, but just as he entered the campus, John had to break into a run as the first bell rang.

"Hello John," Ms. Paint chirped as he walked in. "You're in just in time, I was just about to start calling roll! Take a seat."

John gladly complied, sinking into his chair about three rows back from the front. He glanced around the room, but Rose was nowhere to be found. Fatigue set in almost immediately when he sat down, and he let himself rest his head on his desk as Paint started calling names from the roster.

"Ampora."

"Here," The snooty-looking boy sitting next to John said.

John closed his eyes. When Paint said his name, he mumbled 'here', but soon after that he drifted off into a haze. He had no idea how long it lasted, but soon enough, he felt something sharp point into his shirt.

"Hey," A voice said. _"Hey."_

"Mmph?" John woozily looked up and over to the guy sitting next to him. He had dark hair that was gelled, styled, and dyed with a weird purple streak that looked like a lightning bolt, thick glasses, and a purple scarf wrapped around his neck even though the heater in the classroom was blasting. He was looking at him with irritation.  
  
"Were you even listening?" The guy snapped.

"Uh-yeah-" John looked around and noticed that pretty much everyone in the class was talking loudly, and seemed to be grouped up.

"Yeah fuckin' right." The guy rolled his eyes. "Ya better wake the hell up. Paint just made us partners."

"Partners for what?"

The guy sighed, looking more irritated than ever.

"We have to research one of Shakespeare's plays, trace back what inspired Shakespeare to write it, make a presentation, etcetera," The guy recited in a bored monotone.

"Oh. Okay." John blinked. "What play are we doing?"  
  
"Don't know." The guy flicked his hand at him dismissively. "I'll leave it up to you."

"Okay....sure. Do you at least have an idea?"

"If I had to be frank, I'd admit that I don't fucking give a damn. I'm going to let you take over for today, okay?" The guy leaned back and pulled out his phone, and began fiddling with it. John noticed that his fingernails were painted black.

"Hey man," John said. "I'm not doing this whole thing by myself."

The guy ignored him and continued typing on his phone.

John felt a flicker of irritation. He didn't get angry easily, but a lack of sleep would piss anyone off.

"Look," He began. "I've had a rough night, okay? I'm not in the mood for-"

"Eridan!" A bubbly, feminine voice came, and suddenly a girl came bouncing in and pounced on the guy, gripping his shoulders and giving John a cheerful smile. "Hi! Is that your partner? What play are you guys doing? Omiglub, I am sooooo freaked out about it! What does researching a play have to do with English anyway? Isn't that more like history? I think we should be doing this in a history class instead. Oh, I'm Feferi by the way! What's your name?"

It all came spilling out of her mouth in half a second.

"Uh...." John's sleep-deprived mind was too slow to comprehend any of what she had just said. All he could really process was _shit._  Girl alert. And obviously popular-girl alert. It was obvious by the way she dressed, how her platinum-blonde-dyed hair was styled, how she seemed to carry herself. But she seemed like the nice and bubbly kind of popular and not the mean kind, which made him ease up a little. And she liked her glasses, which were pink and sort of resembled goggles.

"Oh wait...I know you! Uh, John right? John?"

"Yeah..."

"Nice to meet you! This is Eridan-" Feferi poked a disgruntled Eridan in the shoulder. "I'm not sure if he's introduced himself yet. He's kinda grumpy. And an asshole!"

"I am not," Eridan muttered.

"Yes you are." Feferi grinned at John again. "Don't worry. I have come to rescue you from the tide of grumpiness that is Mister Ampora!"

"Fef really," Eridan grumbled.

Feferi just giggled. "Shush, mister! You know it's tr-una!"

"Feferi, aren't we supposed to work on our project?" Said another voice.

At this point, another girl came up behind Feferi. She had cropped hair that was a dark pitch-black, and a stylish red dress paired with heeled black boots.

"Yeah, I know...." Feferi trilled, sounding a bit put out but brightened suddenly. "Hey! Do you want to work on our projects together? We could help you with yours and you could help us with ours maybe?"

"Uh...sure," John said awkwardly.

"Knock yourself out Fef," Eridan grumbled, going back on his phone.

"Great! Kanaya, let's drag our chairs over!"  
  
The other girl, Kanaya, John supposed, just shrugged. In the next second she went across the room, dragged her and Feferi's chairs over next to his and Eridan's, and sat down in one.

"Oh, t-anks!" Feferi sat down in in the other and began chatting again. "Anyway, Ms. Paint said we could do any play, and she also wrote some on the board as examples. But I was thinking we should both do one that's not on the board! Because you know everyone's going to do those."

"Uh-huh." Eridan didn't even bother looking up from his phone.

"Eridan! Stop being such a grumpy gills!"

"Feferi, I don't glubbing give a damn," Eridan muttered.

"Well I glubbing don't care! This is important! One of our first projects of the year, you have to do good on it-"

"Why are you saying glubbing?" John asked.

"Oh!" Feferi laughed. "Inside joke! And a habit, I guess. See, my aunt owns a lot of reel-y big industries, and she started out with 'Imperial Canning.'"  
  
"What?"

"It's part of the fishing industry, sill-y! My aunt owns all the canning places. Get it? Fishing...glubbing..."

"Okay..." John didn't really get it.

"And I've known Eridan like for-EVER! So it's sort of a habit between us!"  
  
"Okay..." John still didn't get it, but decided to let it pass. "When do we have to turn in the project?"  
  
"Couple days, I think! We have the weekend to do it...Monday, I think. Monday, right?" Feferi looked at Kanaya.  
  
"Yes," Kanaya replied, and glanced over at John. "What's your name? I don't believe I know it."

"John."

"Kanaya. Nice to meet you."  
  
"Okay." Couple of days. Okay. John rested his forehead on the surface of his desk. So maybe if he took a nap right now, it wouldn't matter later. He still had a day or two.

"You look tired," Kanaya noted.

"Yeah." John didn't look up. Not to be rude, but the surface of his desk was surprisingly comfortable and he didn't want to look up.

"Hey look," Eridan said suddenly. "Another Midnight Crew sighting at the Betty Crocker factory."

John froze. Again, he didn't look up, but he felt so tense that he could barely breathe.

"Eridan." Feferi's chipper voice suddenly sounded strange. Almost strained.

"Sorry." Now Eridan sounded strange. "Just-just thought you'd want to know-"

"Eridan!" Now Kanaya was chiming in, and she sounded irritated.

They all fell silent. John still didn't look up, and for some reason, they had all gone quiet.

For some reason, none of them said a word for the rest of class and they all silently parted ways once the bell rang.

* * *

 

Rose knew she looked like shit, but she didn't care.

For the first and probably last time in her life, she was grateful for her mother's intoxicated state when she had gotten home the night before. It prevented the questions.

But in the morning, it turned out her mother was so hungover she could barely move. Which meant she had to walk, which meant she would miss first period.

Wasn't like it hadn't happened before.

Before she had slipped off to school, she booted up her laptop. She was expecting a very important message. A very, very important message.

And sure enough, judging by the blinking pesterchum icon, she had gotten it.

  
tentacleTherapist [TT]and ??? other(s) have received a message from cancerousGypsy [CG]

CG: He//o comrades.

My apo/ogies for the /ate circumstances that surround this month/y update. As you a// know, there have been grave disturbances surrounding the Hidden Vei/, and the E/ders have been hard at work attempting to mend these issues.

As you a// know, the Winter Solstice is rapid/y approaching. The Ce/ebration of the High Moon sha// commence as usua/. Invitations sha// be sent short/y, and wi// be in the usua/ format. As you a// know, it is mandatory to attend. Fai/ure to attend is punishab/e by death.

A gathering of the Coven has been schedu/ed in exactly two weeks, on the date that is October 31, A// Hallow's Eve. A// must be present. A// sha// recieve a message short/y with the /ocation of the gathering. Fai/ure to attend is punishab/e by death, un/ess one has a rea//y, rea//y good excuse. And that is a rea//y, rea//y good one comrades. Practica//y no one came to the /ast gathering, and the E/ders are appropriate/y annoyed.

That is a//. Many thanks to your patience, comrades. /ong /ive the Coven.

~cancerousGypsy  
High Messenger of the Council of Elders

She had then closed her laptop and had headed off to school.

The walk wasn't bad, she just lived fairly far away from school. It would have been worse if it was unbearably hot, but even though it was still technically summer, the autumn chill had come early this year.

She made it to school right when first period ended. She waited for John right outside of the classroom door, and when she spotted him coming in that direction, she strode over, grabbed his arm, and pulled him aside.

"Did your father ask questions?" Rose hissed.

"Nice to see you too," John muttered. Besides for the deep dark circles under his eyes, for the most part he had cleaned up.

"Did he?"  
  
"No. He had to leave early this morning, and he didn't hear me come back last night."  
  
"Good." Rose felt a little relief, but not much. She knew they weren't out of the woods yet.  
  
"What about your mom?"

"Intoxicated."  
  
"Oh. That's....lucky I guess."

"I suppose. I hope Jade and Dave managed to elude suspicions as well."

"Well, we'll see Jade in history," John said, his dorky features suddenly tightening in worry. "God, I hope she managed to get herself patched up."

"Me too." Rose sighed. "I'd like to use this opportunity to apologize for my careless, horribly thought-out actions."

And she was sorry. After returning to her abode, she had spent a while lying in bed and carefully considering her actions. Sure she had gotten what she had gone for, but she had inadvertently gotten her companions hurt in the process. Dave was pointedly annoyed with her, and Rose would admit that she could not blame him. She did owe them all an apology, despite that in the end, all had gone fairly well considering the circumstances.

"Well, it's not like any of us did much to stop you," John said uncomfortably.

The bell rang, cutting off their conversation abruptly. John bit his lower lip, and he and Rose quickly stepped inside the classroom.

They didn't see Jade in history. Jade was absent, which made both John and Rose fairly worried. But they were both too afraid to talk about it openly in class, and just silently copied down the notes their teacher put up on the white board.

 

* * *

 

 

Dave hadn't been as lucky as John and Rose in terms of cover-ups. But in his defense, there was no way a dude could keep anything from a man like Bro Strider.  
  
The minute Dave stumbled through the door the night before and nearly tripped over the pile of fake swords in the entryway, a voice had sounded from across the room.

"Well well. Look what the metaphorical cat dragged in."

The lights suddenly switched on and Bro spun slowly around in the shittiest swivel chair Dave had ever seen, with Lil' Cal perched ironically on his lap.  
  
Dave groaned. "Are you fucking kidding me."

"Surprise motherfucker." Bro set Lil' Cal to the side and narrowed his eyes. "You are in a big mess of fucking hot trouble."

Whelp. No fooling around now. Dave was fucked.

"Right." Dave shrugged off his jacket and tossed it on the ground. "Just skip to the part where you kick my ass please."

Bro's eyes narrowed. He took a step forward and picked up Dave's jacket, and Dave realized he'd made a mistake by discarding it so quickly. "Holy shit. Is this blood?"

Dave didn't say anything.

"Dave."

"No. It's ketchup."

Bro snorted. "You're shitting me, right?"  
  
"No. It's ketchup. I went out for hamburgers with John and Rose and-Jade and all those dorks."

"At three in the morning."

"Yep."

Bro rolled his eyes. "You know what? It's fucking late. Get your ass to bed. After school tommorrow?"

"Yeah?"

"You. Me. Rooftops."

Dave fought the urge to groan.

"If I kick your ass, which I probably will, you're gonna tell me everything. All right little man?"

"Yeah. But what'll happen if I win?"

"Ha. Ha. Go to bed."

"Right." Dave turned, and nearly tripped over a pile of soft puppet ass. Making a wide circle around the pile, Dave headed toward his bedroom for much-needed rest, knowing that the upcoming day he was so, so fucked.  
  
As he told John and Rose this on the said upcoming day in the janitor's closet at lunch, both of them let out simotaneous groans.

"You're fucked," John moaned.

"Yep."

"You could try making up a story," Rose suggested. "Instead of-well-the truth."

Dave glared at her.

"Dave. A silent treatment is not a healthy way to express anger."

"Maybe, but do even realize that after the shitstorm that went down last night I am never, ever taking your suggestions seriously ever again?"

"Did you ever take them seriously in the first place?"

"A hell of a lot more than I do now."

Rose quirked an eyebrow. "Is that suppose to prove your point of how little you take my suggestions seriously?"

"Yep."

"Ah."

"She has a point though," John said. "You could just make up a story."

"Are you fucking kidding me? You want me to lie to Bro?" Dave glared at the Sloppy Joe in his lap. "How did it go with your dad?"  
  
"He left early this morning," John replied, as he solemnly popped a fruit gusher in his mouth. "And he didn't wake up when I got back last night. So I'm pretty sure I'm in the clear."

"And my mother was-" Rose began.

"Drunk and hungover," Dave guessed.

She shrugged. "Lucky I suppose."  
  
"Have you heard from Jade?" Dave asked. "She's always saying her grandpa's this badass old dude, so we probably don't want him knowing."

"No," Rose replied. "I'll pester her tonight."

"Yeah, I will too."

"Ditto," John muttered, mouth full of Fruit Gushers.

They sat in grim silence for a minute. Dave suddenly missed Jade, who, if she was here, would have probably in this moment been encouraging them to think positive.

"So you're probably going to have to tell your Bro," John said finally.

"Yeah."

"What do you think will happen when you tell him?"

Before Dave could reply, the door to the closet suddenly swung open.

Dave nearly pissed in his pants at the sound, and he saw the other two jump.

A couple of kids their age stood at the door. A girl and a guy. Fellow students, probably, although they didn't carry backpacks.

They stared at each other for a moment. John looked uneasy, Rose's mascara-coated eyes were narrowed. The two across the door didn't look too threatening, and the didn't flinch as they met their gazes.

The guy didn't have anything on him except for a smartphone in his hand. But the girl however, had a bright red cane in her hand. It's handle looked weird at a distance, but only when Dave really examined it for a second did he realized the top of the cane was crudely carved to look like what was supposed to be a dragon head.

Dave narrowed his eyes and pushed his sunglasses up on his nose, figuring that he had to at least somewhat intimidating doing so.

"Uh...hi," John said after a minute.

The girl grinned. Dave realized that her glasses, which were angled and hid her eyes, matched the same shade of red as her cane. "S'up. Wow, people seriously still eat in here?"

"I'm in it for the smell," Dave said casually. "The cleaning supplies, y'know?"

"May I request the reason for this intrusion?" Rose asked.

"Oh...no reason...." The girl put her hands on her hips and grinned at them. "At least, for your sake I hope there isn't. Is that them?"

"Yep." The boy said boredly. He also wore sunglasses, except one lens was blue instead of red. When he crossed his arms, Dave noticed a tattoo on the back of his left hand, but couldn't quite make out what it was.

"Great!" The girl's smirk turned into a wicked grin. "Oh _Sagitariuuuuuuuuus!"_  
  
At that point, another kid stepped through the doorway, but when he first saw him, Dave didn't think he was a kid. The guy was fucking huge. He easily towered over both the girl and the boy, and Dave, Rose and John for that matter. And his muscles, especially his biceps, were fucking huge. Besides for that, he had long, matted black hair, and, like the other two kids, sunglasses. Except his were black, and completely cracked in the middle. And when he bared his teeth and growled at them, it was easy to tell that some of his teeth were missing.

John let out a little squeaking noise from behind him.

"Oh hello," Dave muttered, fighting the urge to scream like a little girl.  
  
"Shut the door please," The girl said brightly. "This might get nasty."

The other boy wordlessly closed the door behind them.

"What the hell do you think you're doing?" Rose snapped.

"Stay back!" John lept to his feet. "I've seen Kung Fu Panda like twice!"  
  
The girl snorted. "Restrain them please."

The big boy stepped forward, cracking his knuckles.  
  
"Wait!" John raised his hands in the air. "Whatever you want you can have it-"

"Great!" The girl said gleefully. "Then we have your consent to tie you up!"

"Wait what-" John's words were cut off with a yelp as the big guy suddenly lunged forward and lifted him clear off the ground. Dave was about to dash forward and do a super-cool kick to the guy's face to save John's stupid ass when the guy lifted John like a battering ram and literally threw him as Dave.

Dave grunted as John flew into him and the two sailed into the other wall, narrowly missing a shelf of cleaning supplies.

"Look out for the Windex man!" Dave yelled. "You can't do this or-"

A massive fist suddenly closed around his neck and Dave let out a choked gargle which did not sound very smooth at all. John wheezed as the other fist wrapped around his neck; Dave struggled to get a suddenly limited amount of air into his lungs.

He sent a desperate glance over to Rose, but to his shock the girl already had her trapped with the cane against her neck.

Not a cane actually.

A sword.

A fucking sword disguised as a cane.

Rose had never looked more pissed then in that moment, trapped against the other girl's side with a sword preventing her escape. Her hands were gripped at the girl's wrists, but it didn't look like she could move any farther unless she wanted her throat to be slit.

"Do yourselves a favor," The girl snarled. "And let us tie you up. The interrogation will only take a few minutes."

Well shit, Dave thought.

* * *

Meanwhile in the lobby of a shady motel on the edge of town, Spades Slick was brooding in the depths of dark, frustrated rage.

Because the stupid computer he was trying to use was slow as fuck.

"Don't stab it again!" Deuce piped up worriedly.

"What do you think I am?" Slick growled, glowering at the loading screen. "Stupid? If that didn't work the first time why the fuck would it work the second time?"

"Just making sure..."

"Fuck you." Deuce backed a way a little when Slick snarled at him, then focused back on the keyboard. "C'mon you stupid...oh finally."

It taken it forever for the fucking thing to just _turn on._ The desktop sported an image of a sad-eyed cat hanging from a tree branch, with the words 'hang in there' printed on the bottom.

The only reason Slick didn't run a knife through it was because he had ran knives through the other two computers in the lobby.

"Where's the card with the wifi password on it?" Slick growled.

"Right here." Deuce handed him the card. Slick typed in the wifi code, then opened the browser.

"Search for high schools in Skaia!" Deuce said, standing on his tiptoes over Slick's shoulders.

"I know that you idiot," Slick snarled, typing it into the search engine.

Deuce frowned at him as the results slowly popped up one by one. "Are you feeling okay boss? You didn't look so good when you went to bed last night."

"I'm fine, fuck off." Slick scanned the results and found a link to the Skaia High Schoo website. Figuring that must be it, he clicked on it.

"Are you sure? Are you still having headaches? Droog's been really worried about that by the way."

"Oh really?" Slick asked sarcastically, glaring at the screen. Of course it was taking forever to load.

"Yeah! You know how he does the thing where he doesn't show it but he's actually really worried about you? That's him right now!"

"Deuce, shut up."

"Okay."

Finally, finally the website loaded.

**SKAIA HIGH SCHOOL**

**HOME OF THE FIGHTING FROGS!**

Slick scrolled down to see a series of links on one side and a sort of picture slideshow going on right smack in the middle. It circulated through pictures of what were probably the students. It changed from the football team, to a close-up shot of a blonde, freckled cheerleader with pink glasses that looked like goggles, to a picture of four kids sitting at a table looking like they were working on a project.

"Spades!" Deuce suddenly shrieked. "That's them!"

"What?"

"That's them! Those are the kids from the factory!!!" Deuce pointed frantically.

"Where?!"

"The picture slideshow thing! Right there!"

"What?!" Slick stared at the picture but it changed too quickly. "Dammit! Wait-"

In the list of links, there was one that said 'gallery.' Slick clicked on it, and a bunch of sickeningly cheerful pictures of grinning students looking all smug and academic popped up. "Dammit! Where is it?"

"Uh..." Deuce leaned eagerly over Slick's shoulder, squinting. "Uh...scroll down!"

Slick obliged.

"There!" Deuce shrieked. "Right there! That's them!"

Slick eagerly clicked on the picture and a photo of four kids that looked like they were in about ninth grade loaded and displayed itself on the screen.

"That's them?" Slick asked Deuce.

"Yeah! They look a little younger, but that's definitely them!"

"Turn on the printer." Slick gestured to a printer that looked like it was from the time of the dinosaurs in the corner. "I'll print it out."

"Okay!" Deuce eagerly rushed to do his job.

For some reason the printer worked better than the computers, so Slick printed out four copies. He clicked out of the browser and, upon seeing the picture of the cat again, ran a knife through the screen. The sparks that flew out only made him feel more satisfied. He wouldn't be needing the computer again after all.

"Gimme a copy," Slick ordered as he got up from the computer and stalked over to Deuce.

Deuce eagerly presented one of the copies. Slick snatched it from him. The printer was crappy, but he could still see the kids' faces pretty clearly. Two light-haired kids, two dark-haired kids, two boys and two girls. They were looking up from what looked like a group of desks and grinning somewhat awkwardly at the camera. At least the dark-haired kids were. The blonde kids just looked like they didn't give a shit.

Slick snorted. They looked like wimps. The dark-haired boy had the stupidest face he had ever seen in his life, the blond girl looked fairly unassuming, the blond boy looked like he was just a prick who was trying too hard, and the dark-haired girl...

His thought process suddenly screeched to a halt.  
  
_(Jade Harley)_

Suddenly, any triumph he'd had before was gone. All he had was a horrible feeling in his stomach, like he was going to hurl. The headache from the night before was returning with a vengeance

"What do we do now boss?" Deuce continued happily, his voice grating against Slick's eardrums. "We could..." He frowned, noticing the expression on Slick's face. "Are you okay?"

"Deuce, shut the fuck up."

Deuce blinked. "You don't sound okay. Is your head hurting you again?"

"Deuce stop talking right now."

"But-"

"I said shut up!"

_(Jade Harley)_

_(Jade Harley Jade Harley Jade Harley-)_

Slick stalked away, heading towards the exit.

_(Jade Harley **[bark]** Jade Harley **[bark]** Jade Harley)_

"Boss?" Deuce trailed after him. "Spades?"

"Shut up shut up _shut up!"_ Slick, snarled, shoving the double doors open.

"But-" Deuce' voice called. "Do we go after them now or-?"

"Sure! Whatever!"

He didn't check for Deuce's response before letting the doors slam closed, but at least the stupid little bastard didn't follow him.

Good. At least he could take a fucking hint.

The cool, crisp autumn air jarred his senses, and he suddenly realized he didn't have a coat. The lobby and the inside of their room was heated, so why the fuck would he?

Whatever. Coats were for pansy-ass idiots. He didn't need a coat.

The daylight hurt his eyes too. Which did not help the headache at all and he was forced to squint his good eye nearly shut to block out the worst of it.

_(Jade Harley Jade Harley Jade Harley Jade Harley Jade Harley-)_

Slick shivered, teeth beginning to chatter. He had to get to a bar. A few drinks tended to drown out the voices in his head.  
  
At least, for a while.

* * *

 

Jade had no idea where she was.  
  
Like, no idea at all.

She couldn't even describe where she was. Like standing in a void of black maybe. Walking in the middle of a black hole.

Which was definitely new.

She just had to keep walking.

And walking.

And walking.

**(Shut up)**

Jade suddenly stopped.

"Excuse me?" Jade called.

No response.

"Is...Jade looked around. She still couldn't see anything. Or anyone. "Is someone here?"

**(If this doll doesn't shut up...)**

"Doll?" Jade repeated.

No answer.

"Who's in here?" Jade asked, feeling more annoyed than nervous.

Suddenly, Jade saw someone in the distance. A huddled figure.  
  
"Hello?" Jade called.

**(It calls hello...)**

Jade swallowed. Now she was nervous. "I won't hurt you..."

**(It lies...)**

"Are you okay?" Jade whispered. She took several steps forward.

**(It approaches...)**

"Are-" Jade froze.

And she saw it.  
  
"OH MY GOD-"

**(It screams...)**

Jade screamed.

**(Screams unTIL BLOOD RUNS THICK and nO ONE caN HeAr IT SCREAM------)**

**(NO OnE caN heaR It SCreAm--------)**

 Without warning, everything went black.


	6. Episode 2: Showtime (Part 3)

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Hoo boy, it's been a while. Enjoy this last part of episode 2, and I have no idea when I'll get the parts of episode 3 up. Yeah. Okay then.

  
**Friday, 1:24 PM**

She had been taught at a young age that people were sheep, raised to be slaughtered by the passing of time.

When she had gotten older, however, she would be smart enough to say fuck that. And now she was powerful enough to make time her bitch.

You know, if she really wanted to.  
  
But she had bigger irons in the fire than that.

* * *

 

Jade woke up with a start.

She blinked, and then winced. Her leg hurt horribly, even though she had bandaged it the night before and taken some pain medicine. Although pain pills from the supermarket probably weren't strong enough for a bullet wound, which she probably should have taken into consideration.

She was lying on the top of her bed, still in the clothes from last night. Jade vaguely remembered coming into the living room to bandage her leg. But she didn't actually remember falling asleep. Not like she ever remembered falling asleep anymore. Or that she got much sleep in the first place.  
  
Bec was sleeping on the floor, right at her side, as always. Light was streaming in through the smalls cracks in the blinds that covered the outside of her bedroom window.

Jade took a minute to mull over the blinds. She didn't really like them. She preferred her windows to be covered with curtains only, giving it a lighter, much more refreshing atmosphere. But nowadays, she was more than a tad paranoid. Buying and installing the blinds had been sort of a comfort. But that didn't mean she had to like them. You could barely see the morning light out of them...

Oh crap. Speaking of morning light, what time was it?

Jade glanced over at the clock on her bedside table and gasped a little. How was it already noon?! How could she have slept in that late?

Okay, stupid question. Last night was pretty eventful.  
  
"You should have woken me up Bec!" Jade scolded her dog.

Bec barely moved from his spot on the floor. He merely lifted one eyelid lazily, then shut it again.

Jade sighed. "Oh well. Maybe I should wait until my leg's a little more healed before I go back to school." Jade winced a little when she made the mistake of shifting it slightly to emphasize her point. "Ouch."

She tried to sit up, but moving that much somehow caused the pain in her leg to flare up again. She settled to raising herself up on one elbow and using the other hand to flip a strand of unruly dark hair out of her eyes.

It was only the first week of school, and she'd already nearly gotten killed and possibly killed someone. That was pretty eventful! She had thought she was done with nearly getting killed last summer but...

Okay, wasn't thinking about last summer. Nope.

Or her bullet piercing Diamonds Droog's shoulder....

"I might have killed someone Bec," Jade said softly. "I can't believe it. It was just so easy..."

She watched Bec sigh one of his little doggy sighs and he got up, shifting his massive body around so that his enormous white head was resting right next to her arm, with his nose nuzzling her elbow.

"I'm really glad you were there," Jade told him honestly. "I didn't think we'd be in that much danger. Heck, I didn't even think they would actually be there. Guess I was wrong, huh?"

Bec yawned, his massive jaws opening wide and then clamping down in a gentle nip against her arm.

Images from the night before began to flood her head, images of blood and dark rooms and gunfire and really scary stuff. Jade shuddered a little when she suddenly remembered the green guys.

"You didn't see it, but there was a green guy there. A guy with glowing green skin." She saw one of Bec's eyes crack open again and peer over at her. "Yeah, I know. He was going to kill us. I shot him, but I saw him later...but he was killed by the other big guy... He's dead for sure now isn't he?" Jade scratched behind one of Bec's ears. "We were way out of our league, huh boy? I might have killed Diamonds Droog, and there's nothing really I can do about now...." Jade trailed off for a minute, trying to get her thoughts together, before continuing. "We also met Clubs Deuce. Met him in person. It was crazy. I still can't believe it. And...I think I killed Diamonds Droog..."

Both of Bec's eyes were now open, and they were looking up at her almost quizzically.

Jade could never get over how human Bec's eyes looked sometimes. They were a bright green, almost identical to the hue of her own eyes. Dave had said multiple times that they were creepy as fuck, but Jade had always found them comforting. They reminded her that she was never alone, and would always have a loyal companion at her side to protect her. Although she doubted he understood a word of what she said.

Then Bec suddenly stood up, and trotted over to her bedroom door. He stopped suddenly, tail and ears flicking up. Then he attacked one of her stuffed animals, clamping it in his jaws and shaking it back and forth.

"Bec no!" Jade scrambled to her feet. Guess it was time to get up then. "Oh ow ow ow _ow-"_ She hobbled over to her dog and grabbed his collar firmly.

"Drop it," Jade growled.

Bec whined, but opened his mouth and let it fall to the ground.

Jade picked up the stuffed animal and inspected it for damage, feeling dismayed when she ran her thumb over a rather large tear in the toy.

It was the stuffed Scottish Terrier she'd had for as long as she could remember. It was the same toy she had cuddled with every time she felt scared, or lonely, or angry. It was old and on the verge of falling apart, but it was still Jade's absolute favorite stuffed animal.

"Bec, how could you?" Jade demanded. She carefully wiped up the slobber all over the toy with her sleeve, and smoothed back it's fake fur. "Ugh, you just want to be fed don't you?"

Almost on cue, Bec turned around and trotted down the hallway.

"Fine," Jade sighed. "I'll feed you, and then leave a message for John, Rose, and Dave on pesterchum. They're probably worried!"

She inspected the toy again and frowned when she realized there was another rip in it's leg.

_Bec, why?!_

She decided to captchalogue it, knowing that simply using the system would be a reminder in itself to get it mended.

Jade didn't use her modus often. Quite possibly one of the most high-tech pieces of equipment ever made, it was the product of a special Harley Corp invention that her grandfather barely had time to patent before he died. He had given a version to her for her fifth birthday, and she continued to use it since. But since it was his last invention before he died, she kept it's existence to herself. Even from her friends.

Like her stuffed dog, in a way. It was her favorite toy, but it was so special to her that she never really told anyone about it. Even though she wasn't exactly sure whether her grandfather was the one who got it for her.

The barking from downstairs prompted her to capatchalogue the toy and start to limp downstairs.

Wait a second.

She never used the stairs!

Duh.

Jade turned around and headed over to the transportilizer in the corner of her bedroom. She pressed the button that would transport her to the kitchen and closed her eyes, feeling her subatomic particles breaking apart and rearranging downstairs. It was a weird feeling, but she sort of enjoyed it.

Technology sure was great.

"Hi Grandpa!" Jade said cheerfully as she stepped off the pad.

Her grandfather stared off into the distance, not responding. He never did anyway. Although it was weird he was in the kitchen. Normally he was in the library, stewing in his own intensity and charisma. He was a serious guy, after all. His company used to be one of the most influential technology-exploration-archeology-innovative companies in the world, and had made him one of the richest men alive. His adventures around the world had adwarded him priceless artifacts and treasure, several of which Jade had pawned to pay off taxes and the taxidermist who had stuffed her grandfather's corpse. She hadn't particularly wanted to get her grandfather's corpse stuffed, but that's what he had wanted in the will. It was a Harley family tradition after all.

"I know I didn't go to school today," Jade continued to address her grandfather. "But I hurt my ankle the other day and I decided to just take a day to be safe."

She could practically feel the suspicion and disapproval radiating off from him. But there's no way she was going to admit how she got hurt.

"I just twisted my ankle, I promise! After I'm done in the basement I'll prop it up on ice, okay?"

As serious as her grandfather was, she knew he adored her. Beaming, Jade went to the cupboard.

_Let's see..._ Jade scoured the cupboard. What could she make? Pancakes! The cupboard was mostly empty, and the box of pancake mix was pretty much the only thing in there. She took it off the shelf, and opened it.

Inside the box, the powdered mix had turned a deep shade of yellow. Also there were maggots swarming in there.

Jade limped over to the trashcan and dumped it.

Leftover pizza it was then!

* * *

 

John was having a very bad day.

He, Rose, and Dave had been roughly tied up by the big guy, who was now standing at the closed closet door. The other guy with multi-colored glasses was standing next to him, only he had taken his phone out and was tapping away at it.

And the girl, who John had decided was completely nuts by this point, kept whacking him in the head with a cane.

"I asked you," The girl growled. "What. Is. The color. _OF YOUR UNDERWEAR?!!"_

"Whi-white..." John stammered.

"WRONG ANSWER!" She smacked him in the head with her cane. Hard.

"Ow!"

"How is this relevant?" Rose snapped, looking irritated.

"I want to make sure his memory is working!" The girl snapped. "If he can't even remember the color of his underwear, how the hell am I supposed to get the answers I want?!"

"You're fucking insane," Dave grumbled.

"Quiet! I'll be doing the talking around here!" The girl replied shortly, swinging her cane back around and letting it connect sharply with the ground. "Now Mr. Egbert, I'll ask you one more time. What is. The color. _OF YOUR UNDERWEAR?!!!"_  
  
"It's white!" John repeated frantically. Anything to not be whacked in the head with that cane again. "I just told you they're white!"

"I smell that you're leaving out an important detail," The girl said mischeviously, sniffing the air and grinning obnoxiously.

"What the fuck TZ," The boy in the bi-colored glasses muttered.

"White with pictures of candy corn one them! I swear that's it!"  
  
Dave snorted. "Sexy."

"Shut up!" John glared at Dave, then at the girl. "Happy?!"

"That wasn't so hard now, was it?" The girl said smoothly. "Now let's get down to business! How many of you would like to bet that I know where you were last night?"

That took a minute to sink in.

"What-" Dave began.

"What on earth are you talking about?" Rose asked, sounding genuinely perplexed.

John had to give her credit, she was a pretty good liar. He doubted he could have done the same, because at the moment, he was seriously on the verge of freaking the fuck out.

How could they have known? There was no way they could possibly know. Right?

"So you want us to guess?" The guy, the not-huge one, asked coldly.

"Shut up Sol-uh, Gemini, I'm in charge here!" The girl snapped. "Just show 'em the picture."

The guy, Gemini, John assumed, tapped at his phone a little more, flipped it around and displayed the screen.

John's stomach twisted. It was the blurry photos taken of what were supposedly the Midnight Crew at the Betty Crocker factory.

"You're displaying it right?" The girl muttered to Gemini.

"Yep."

"Good." She turned back to them and grinned that crazy grin. John was just about to wonder how the hell she couldn't see whether the guy was holding up the picture or not, but when she turned to face them again he suddenly noticed her eyes.

And holy shit. Her eyes.

John couldn't see them very well through the red plastic, but he could vaguely make out how white and scarred they looked. They looked as if someone had at least thrown acid in them multiple times. Immediately, his stomach twisted slightly.

What had happened to her?

"Three days ago, at 3:43 AM, these photos went viral," The girl began, breaking John's horrified fascination with her eyes. "Taken by an anonymous user, and were posted anonymously on a police blog. There were attempts to trace these photographs, but whoever posted them used sophisticated technology to do so."

Gemini let out an annoyed sigh. "Sophisticated technology my ass. We all know who it was."

The girl paused her monologue to give him a dark look. The big guy at the door cleared his throat uncomfortably. After a minute, the girl turned back to John and his friends.  
  
"As I was saying-"

"Hold up-" Dave interrupted. "What's going on here, exactly?"

"What's going on here is that we know you were at Crocker's last night!" The girl snapped.

"No we weren't!" John protested.

"What on earth gave you that absurd idea?" Rose asked. Again, John was amazed at how good of a liar she was. "Why would any complete idiot forgo all common sense and basic safety standards to purposely infiltrate a heavily fortified facility possibly harboring criminal activity?"

"What kind of idiot, huh?" Dave grumbled under his breath, then hissed as Rose discretely pinched him on the side.

The girl didn't seem to notice, and rolled her unseeing eyes. "Gemini, show 'em the next pictures, if you will."

Gemini, without a word, tapped his phone a few more times, and displayed the phone for them to see.

All at once, John's stomach dropped to his shoes.

Silently, Gemini scrolled through the photos while still holding it up for them to see. There were a total of five shots of them dragging themselves out of the factory. They were grainy, hard to see, but one could distinctly make out their faces.

Even Rose and Dave were silent as Gemini put the phone down and the girl smirked.

"Any more bullshit you want to feed me?" She said brightly.

"How did you-" Rose looked at a loss for words.

"Wait, were those posted online too?!" John asked, panicked.

"Doesn't matter. Explain yourselves."

"What do you mean it doesn't matter?!" John snapped. "I think it matters! Do you think it matters Dave?"

"Uh, yeah."

"And Rose, do you think it matters?"

"Absolutely," Rose grumbled.

"There you go! It matters!"

"They weren't posted on the website," Gemini, or whatever his name was, said. "Nobody except us knows you were there, so don't worry about that."

"Then how did you get them?" Dave asked, scowling.

The girl drummed her fingers against her cane lazily. "If you tell us, we tell you. Capiche?"

John glowered at her.

"All right," Rose didn't seem bothered. "I am a reporter for the school newspaper-"

"Yeah yeah, I know." The girl waved her hand dismissively. "You work for the paper, I know. Your school lunch updates are a drag, I gotta say."

Rose narrowed her eyes. "Considering that the paper seems to actively enjoy wasting talent and time, the work you read, or don't read considering the state of your eyes, you're getting the best you can get. So apologies if it disappoints."

It was probably the mention of her eyes. The girl looked like she wanted to smash Rose's head in with her weird red cane when Gemini butted in.

"Hang on, you dragged your friends to, as you put it, 'an extremely fortified facility possibly harboring criminal activity' so you could get a better story for the paper?"

"Yes," Rose snarled.  
  
Gemini snorted, and turned to the girl. "So you still think these guys are spies, _Libra_?"

"I don't know." The girl (Libra?) narrowed her eyes. "Egbert's still giving me a weird vibe."  
  
"Egbert?!" Dave exclaimed, sounding aghast. "You seriously came here thinking Egbert here was a spy? I mean, I can see why you'd think I'm a spy, 'cause of the shades and my amazingly cool exterior, not to mention Rose has a whole creepy thing going on, but I can reassure you that Egbert is not a goddamn spy."

"Hey!" John protested, feeling a little insulted despite of himself.

"If anybody's giving you a weird vibe, it should be me," Dave declared.

"Trust me Dave, your vibes are plenty _weird,"_ Rose muttered.

"Shut up!" Libra snapped. "I just realized. There's only three of you here right now right?"

"No, there's like a hundred," Dave drawled.

Libra glared at him. "Where's the other one? What's her name...."

"Jade," Gemini added. "She's in my bio class. I don't think she's here today."

Libra grinned wickedly. "Hmmm. Suspicious, suspicious."

"Jade's not a spy either!" John protested. "She got hurt last night, that's all. She probably just wanted a day to rest."

"Suspicious, suspicious, suspicious...." Libra droned, beginning to pace back and forth again.

"You really think Harley's a spy?" Gemini snorted. "I mean yeah, she's kinda weird, but if she's a spy I'll shove my phone up my ass."  
  
"People can put up fronts, my dear Gemmie," Libra mused.

"Look, my uh, dad's gonna worry if I don't come home on time," John interrupted, which was the honest truth. "And he might call the police. That won't be good for you."

"Similiar to my mother," Rose added.

"Yeah," Dave chimed in, somewhat lamely.

Gemini sighed. "Look, I'm pretty sure the others have met them before, and can vouch for the fact that they're just a bunch of completely stupid assholes who fucked up. We go to a fucking small school after all. So let's just have Cancer call a meeting at Pisces' place, have this asshole here-" He gestured to the big guy in the corner, whose eyes narrowed. "-contact PM again, and maybe she can deal with them."

"What 'others'?" John asked, beginning to feel desperate. "PM? What's PM? What the hell is going on?"

"You fucked up for one," Gemini said flatly.

"Grab 'em, Sagittarius!" Libra waved her hand, and the big guy came forward.

"Up on your feet," The guy growled.

"You won't be able to get us past the proctors!" Rose protested, somewhat feebly.

Gemini just snorted. "Yeah, doubt that."

"I will untie you all," Sagittarius said. "But if you run we will come after you, so there is really no point."

"Good to know," Dave grumbled as Sagittarius reached over and began to untie the ropes binding him to John and Rose.

"Can we at least know your guys' real names?" John asked nervously. "I mean, there's no way your real names are Libra and Gemini and all that-"

"They're code names!" Libra snapped. "So no-"

"I'm Sollux," Gemini cut in. "That's Terezi, and the sweaty guy's Equius."

Saguttarius-no-Equius-slowly raised his head. "Who exactly are you calling. _Sweaty."_

"GEMINI!!!" Terezi hissed.  
  
"I don't care what you say, these goobers are not fucking spies."

"Ugh!" As soon as John, Rose, and Dave were untied Terezi marched over to the door and swung it open, gesturing to the outside with her cane. "Forward march losers! Sollux, since you ruined our cover, you get to tell Karkles what's going on."

"Joy," Sollux muttered, stalking out the door.

Rose scowled, and followed, and eventually, so did Dave and John, with Equius trailing behind. Terezi came in last, slamming the door shut behind her.

"We can take my car," Sollux said, while beginning tapping at his phone again.

"Mine is bigger," Equius pointed out.

"Well, yours is a piece of shit EQ."

"It is not. It's big, and it's motor is STRONG-"

"We can't just leave in the middle of school!" Rose interrupted. "What will your parents think if they come to pick you up and you're gone?!"

"Re-lax." Terezi slammed the cane into ground. At the loud, sharp sound, a group of students who were close enough to hear it but not to make out everything else jumped, shooting glances in their direction. "What did I say? Forward march! Proctors probably won't even know we're leaving."

* * *

 

She was hobbling down the alley, feeling anything other than pathetic. How could she feel pathetic? There was no reason for her to feel pathetic. Her very existence was pathetic, so feeling pathetic would have been a big fat contradiction, and she hated those.

Her phone buzzed. Before answering she took a second to tighten the tourniquet around her bleeding stump of an arm, cursing her previous opponent for being a huge piece of shit.

GA: You fought him didn't you?  
AG: You were right.  
AG: That's the only time I'm going to say it, 8ut yeah. You were right.  
AG: Happy?  
GA: Not in the slightest.  
GA: I am concerned.  
AG: Oh I 8et you are.  
GA: How did you do?  
AG: How the fuck do you think?  
GA: He kicked your ass.  
AG: He kicked my fucking ass.  
AG: How the hell can I not control him?  
GA: He's using something to cancel out your a8ilities.  
GA: Most likely an o8ject created by the Copperhead.  
AG: Aranea?  
GA: Yes?  
AG: H8ve you found them yet?  
GA: Oh yes.  
GA: Pyrope, Zahhak, and Captor are leaving with them now.  
GA: I'm keeping a very respectful distance.  
AG: Gr8.  
AG: I'll 8e where I am now.  
GA: Shouldn't you 8e seeking medical attention?  
AG: Ha.  
AG: Funny.   
AG: Good8ye.

She tossed her phone to the ground and slid down against the wall to follow it. When she picked it up again she swore-the screen had cracked.

Stupid fucking universe and it's stupid fucking grudge against her.

As she looked up at the sky, she blinked. Dark gray clouds had settled up in the sky, and there were small white flecks beginning to fall. What the hell? Wasn't it a little early for snow?

A fleck of white landed on the bare back of her hand and almost instantly melted. She shivered and rubbed it. Yep. It was snow all right. And of course she had forgotten a sweater.

Stupid. Fucking. Universe.

She was going to put one over it one day. Not today maybe, but someday...

* * *

 

**2:05 PM**

All in all, Jade had to admit she sort of enjoyed being at home. She went everywhere constantly afraid that she would randomly fall asleep in a random place-the mall, at school, in the middle of the road, where a car was heading towards her...

Thank god her narcolepsy had sort of calmed down by the time she started high school. She had her bouts every now and then, but those were nothing compared to before. She hadn't even been sure if she could go to school anymore, which would have been horrible because that would have meant that she wouldn't see her friends as often.

But she still sort of lived with a paranoia she would fall asleep on a crosswalk or something. Which is why she normally felt more comfortable at home or other safe environments, especially when she was with her friends or with Bec. Although Bec was with her almost everywhere she went, so his coming and occasional going wasn't that big of a change.

Besides for her grandfather and Bec, Jade lived alone in an old house on the edge of town. Her home wasn't that far away from the Betty Crocker factory, actually, a fact that she didn't really want to think about. But her house wasn't so far away that it was hard to get to and from school, and besides, she also had all sorts of gadgets to keep her company. She even had her own makeshift lab in the basement, where she experimented with all sorts of the neat technology she had inheirited from Grandpa.

Two slices of slightly irradiated pizza later (one for her, one for Bec), Jade was sitting curled up on her couch. Since she forgot to make the last Netflix payment, she had settled on reruns of "Gilmore Girls." It wasn't one of her favorites, but it was better than nothing.

_"We interrupt this program to bring an urgent weather report,"_ The newslady that had suddenly appeared on her screen announced. _"Experts have detected a severe snowstorm heading towards Washington County, expected to hit by tonight. While definitely early in the season, locals are advised to prepare for the storm."_

_Early in the season is right,_ Jade thought with a frown.

Without warning, the lights flickered. The television screen went black, and the room went dark.  
  
_Great._

"Must have blown a fuse," Jade muttered, getting to her feet somewhat unsteadily. "Bec! Where are you boy?"

Bec immediately appeared at her side, causing her to jump. Jade scowled down at him.

"You know, it's really creepy when you do that!" Jade told him. "Come on, help me to the stairs."

Since the power was out, that meant she had to take the stairs.

_Fuck._

* * *

 

They had not blown a fuse, as it turned out, instead the power in itself had been knocked out. Jade shivered as she closed the fuse box, turning around to lean heavily against Bec as she limped back inside. Time to break out the blankets, candles, and fireplace because it was going to get cold.

So that was what she did, even though she could practically feel her leg beginning to swell. She lit several candles and the pile of wood she gathered into the fireplace, and gathered a mountain of blankets on the sofa across the fireplace. She settled down into the pile, wrapping herself in blankets and propping her leg up on the coffee table.

Grateful that she had left her phone on the sofa, she pulled up pesterchum preparing to send a message to her friends. However, she immediately forgot about doing anything of the sort when she realized she had gotten a text message that she had been waiting for.

TA: hey jade  
TA: fiinally fiixed the program 2o iif you want you can drop the driive off wiith me at 2chool and iill let you know iif ii hacked iit  
TA: let me know

Jade squealed excitedly. Oh god, she wish she could have gone to school today! The sooner the stupid thing was hacked the better.

GG: hey sollux!!! :D  
GG: thats awesome!!! i couldnt make it to school today, but ill probably be there monday! i can give the chip to you in chem!  
GG: thanks!!!

She was about to close down her messages when she suddenly heard a violent crash in the kitchen and a bark.

Paranoia immediately laced it's way through her and she immediately drew Grandpa's rifle from her modus.

"Bec?" Jade called warily.  
  
Bec began to bark. Not a _'please oh please play with me'_ bark, but an _'uh oh something is wrong you should probably check this out'_   bark.

Jade carefully got to her feet and hobbled towards the front door. She decided to captchalogue the rifle and draw her pistol, while it wasn't her weapon of choice it was a lot better for close range than the rifle.

To her alarm, the front door was open and Bec was standing in the entryway barking excitedly. But it wasn't just those two observations that freaked her out. It was also the fact there there was a guy lying motionless in her doorway.

In what looked like a pool of blood.

And he wasn't moving.

"Oh my god!" With the pistol in one hand, Jade ran over to the man's side. Bec stopped barking and took a step back, watching with narrowed green eyes as Jade flipped him over on his back.  
  
He was dressed entirely in black, but wasn't wearing a coat. That was the first thing Jade noted, which probably wasn't good considering how freezing it was outside. His shirt was ripped in some places, not to mention stained with blood. There was a nasty looking scratch on his forehead, which was dripping blood on the rest of his face, and his eye-

Jade paused and frowned. He was wearing an eyepatch, so if he was missing an eye, it was probably an old injury.

A thought suddenly struck her. A description from the newspaper. Dressed in black. Wears an eyepatch.

No.

There was no way.

Jade swallowed and examined his hands. They were clad in black gloves, and when she pulled one off she realized at least one of his hands was made of metal.

_Shit._

Dressed in black, wears an eyepatch, metal arm, and she wasn't seeing a spade symbol anywhere but she doubted there was anyone else in town with one eye and one arm.

_Oh god oh god oh god-_

Jade took a deep breath. She had to keep her cool. There was no actual indication that this guy was Spades Slick anyway. And this guy was unconscious-if anything she had to get him inside. 

But after what happened at the factory...

Crap. She was trying really hard not to panic, but it was hard.

* * *

 

It was definitely starting to snow now. She wrapped her arms tighter around herself, ignoring how she was bleeding and bruised to the point where she was probably going to bleed out at any second.

She tapped the screen of her cracked phone, managing to reopen her messages to reread her sister's words.

On the sidewalk down the alley from her, a streetlight flickered. Like a flickering candle on the small, crappy birthday cake Terezi once made for her when she was young and crying, one of the only times she had ever cried in her entire life.

Because she had nothing else left, Vriska Serket closed her eyes and made a wish.

* * *

"What time are we supposed to leave?"

"Soon."

Stitch carefully untied the last effigy hanging from the ceiling, letting the rope drop to the ground and placing it, yellow hat and all, in it's case. Not that the Felt really needed their effigies anymore.

"She's going to be pissed if you avoid her for too long," Stitch remarked.

Lady Crocker shifted uncomfortably from her position sitting on an unused crate. It was times like these where Stitch wasn't afraid to refer to her as Jane. Like him, she was a one-trick pony. Unlike him, however, her area of expertise wasn't useless at this time. Thus she could still get away with using that title. But Stitch knew for a fact that once she outlived her use to the Condesce, she would be appropriately retired.

He almost felt disappointed in the notion. He honestly kind of liked the lass-she was a break from all the other idiots he had to deal with on a regular basis. But there were some things he couldn't change, and he sure as hell wasn't going to get killed over her. His job was already tricky enough as it was.

"I doubt she'll notice I'm gone, actually," Jane finally said.

"What the even hell went missing?" Stitch asked, dropping the effigies into a large, black briefcase.

Because of course, nobody actually knew what the crew (likely Spades) had stolen, but judging by the Condesce's shrieks, cusses, and threats it had been pretty important.

Jane stiffened. "The...bunny in the box."

He stilled.

Well wasn't that another matter entirely.

"You're joking."

"No."

Stitch sighed. "Well then."

Jane sighed. "Yup."

At the same time though, Stitch was almost glad. The bunny was way out of his forte. It was something he probably wouldn't have to deal to much in. That was all Lady Crocker's gig, and her gig alone.

"Well." Stitch began untying the last of the effigies. "Good luck."

She actually looked sort of grateful, the naive soul. "Thanks."

As she left, Stitch glanced over at her effigy in particular. Deep gashes, likely from Condy's wrath, were already torn in the fabric. He could see her limp a little as she walked out.

There was an interesting thing about being a one-trick pony-when nobody was making you do your tricks they left you alone to watch the rest of the show.

***End of Episode Two***


End file.
